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Friday, 07 September 2007

Terrible Nightmare

I had a really nasty nightmare. I have no idea why at this point. I haven't had a nightmare in a long time...

The dream involved houses. There was a smaller house and a larger one, very like the block on which my parents live. They have a very large Edwardian two-story house with a full attic, and next door is a house of the same era, but on one level (although it does have a finished partial basement, I happen to know).

In my dream I was in the house next door. It was my house. I rented it or owned it or I was housesitting or something, but I had a key to it. I was there and somehow I was taken prisoner by a sort of... mad scientist doctor. Think "Nazi medical experiments" for an idea of what sort of doctor this was. Doing weird experiments on people that amounted to torture, that sort of thing. The doctor had set up his headquarters in the big house next door (i.e., the house that was/is my parents' house).

He and his thugs had a lot of people there. Whole families, there were a number of kids. My little girls were there, too. Zoë was misbehaving a bit, and I was trying desperately to keep her still and quiet. In real life she's actually mildly autistic, so we kind of have to make exceptions and allowances for her at times, and I was trying to convey this to the thugs with regard to her behavior. I was very frightened, and trying desperately to keep the little girls safe, and maybe find a way to get away...

Then the scene sort of changed and I couldn't find the girls. I went outside, out the front door and I saw this huge plastic bag full of people! These were the "rejects", the ones the doctor didn't want to keep around, so they were just bundled up in this big plastic bag to suffocate to death. Both my little girls were in there, much to my horror.

I rushed over and tore open the bag and got them out (I don't know what happened to anyone else who was in the bag; that wasn't part of the dream), and then ran to the house next door. I got in with my key and I ran to the phone. There was someone else with me at that point, a woman. I'm not sure if she'd been in the big house with me or if she was waiting in the smaller house. We were friends, though, or at least well acquainted. I told her to call the police immediately, and she did. I did the same, but I got put on hold! I was there, holding the phone, terrified, listening to that horrid piped in music that they play when they want to make you think they actually care that there's someone on hold... I said something to her about being on hold, and she was, as well.

Then the phone went dead and the thugs from next door burst in and I realised the phone lines had been cut. I turned and looked at them and was just completely terrified, because I knew they were going to take me back, and they said as much. My little girls were there with me, and I had my hands on them, trying to protect them, knowing I couldn't do anything at all...

I woke up then. I woke up saying, out loud, "Nightmare... nightmare... I had a nightmare..." I woke up Andrew saying it. I didn't mean to wake him up, but I had to say out loud that it was only a nightmare, that's how frightened I was. I wasn't screaming (I've been known to wake from a nightmare screaming), but I was gasping. Once I assured myself that it was only a nightmare, I turned over and managed to go back to sleep. What I dreamed after that I honestly don't remember (which is very strange for me).

I don't know what this meant. I can make a few guesses. Being dragged back to my parents' house (they weren't there, by the way, it was just their house, but that house represents the person I was when I was still their daughter), that's kind of obvious. Trying to save the little girls... I don't know. I've often had nightmares about Zoë being lost, but that was when I was coming to terms with her autism. This dream was more along the lines of the nightmares I had for so many years where I was being chased by monsters or Nazis or assassins or even demons. It was like the demons were telling me that I couldn't escape from them....

Really, I don't know. I just know it was absolutely terrifying, and I don't know what it meant or why I had it at this time. That's worrisome.

Wednesday, 05 September 2007

Don Henley again

I dreamed of Don Henley (of the Eagles and a successful solo career). This is the second time I've done so. It seems like it's somehow significant, as it's very, very unusual for me to dream of the same celebrity more than once. It is common for me to have dreams with random male celebrities, mind you, and usually they're those kind of dreams, but they're almost always one-off dreams. This dream was in no way sexual, and the figure of Don Henley was a sort of mentor, plus it's the second time I've dreamed of him, which makes me think it's something I should pay attention to.

Furthermore, the dream involved a house, a huge Victorian or Edwardian house that I had never seen before but which I fell in love with. It was, literally and figuratively, a "dream house". In my waking life, I would never really want to own a huge turn of the century house. I've lived in one, and they're more trouble than they're worth unless they've been extensively remodelled, usually to the point of gutting it almost completely and rebuilding everything inside for modern comfort. However, in the dream, this house was everything I wanted in a house. It did need some remodelling, and I had some ideas where I'd start. When I was there in the dream, the house was being used as a hotel sort of thing, kind of a hostel or a B&B, but I wanted it to just live in...

I can guess where some of the imagery comes from (we're thnking about housing a lot, lately), but I can't work out the Don Henley part. I suppose it's something to do with the Eagles having been extremely influential in my life (and a lot of peoples' lives), and me having wanted to see them in concert since I was a teenager, but with them breaking up and so on, I never thought I'd get the opportunity. Then, a couple years ago, I DID get to see them in concert, on the Farewell I, tour... We tried for tickets but thought we'd lost out because they were selling out so quickly! But Andrew managed to get us a pair of tickets and I was so happy! Seeing the Eagles was a longtime desire/wish/dream that came true, even when I didn't think it would be possible. I'm thinking that the figure of Don Henley was chosen by my subconscious for that reason.

Perhaps this dream is telling me something prophetic about getting the house we want. I hope so... But I'll keep thinking about it, anyway.

Tuesday, 04 September 2007

Ten Years Already?

It's just slightly over ten years now since I last spoke to either of my parents. I recall most of the content of the conversation quite well, even now. In a nutshell she blamed me for their actions (i.e., when I was four years old and they went out and left me home alone with no supervision and I got into trouble and then got a beating when they got home, that was my own fault), she told me they weren't willing to help me avoid homelessness (which I was facing) but that I should give them the address of the homeless shelter I went to so they could "keep in touch", she told me I should "pull myself up by my own bootstraps" (something she knows absolutely NOTHING about), and she basically accused me of being delusional because I was upset about the death of Diana Princess of Wales (yeah, me and millions of other people, maybe I wasn't quite so crazy as she thought...). There's more but that's the stuff that really pissed me off at the time. Some of it still kind of does. I'm going to try to release it completely when I'm done writing this. Or maybe while I'm writing it...

Anyway, I didn't say, "Ah hah! That's IT! I'll never speak to them again!" or anything. I just quietly seethed and when I saw my counsellor again I mentioned how irritated my mother made me and the counsellor asked me, "Why do you talk to her then? From everything you've told me, your parents seem pretty toxic," and of course, she was right. They were, and they are. And I didn't have any good reason to talk to them. They made it absolutely crystal clear that they were not going to help me in any way and that they didn't care if I became homeless. Given that, it seemed like a no brainer to just stop talking to them.

At first, I just thought I'd stop talking to them "for a while". But as time passed and I got stronger and smarter and managed to make a life for myself without their help, I just didn't feel like talking to them. And then when I realised that I was a lot happier without their poison in my life all the time, I did kind of decide to just never talk to them again.

I didn't have a phone (couldn't afford it!) so they couldn't call me. As far as they knew, I'd lost my home and was living in a shelter, so they didn't come to visit (not that they would have). I did get a card from my mother around Christmas that year trying to make me feel guilty and manipulate me, but I just rolled my eyes and threw it in the bin. And I think there was another card at some point, maybe a birthday? Can't remember. Not that my mother ever remembers when my birthday is (I'm her only child, mind you, and she doesn't know when I was born). I didn't even open that card.

Basically, the longer I went without contact with them, the more I realised I had aboslutely NO REASON to contact them. I had no purpose in contacting them. I wasn't willing to play their little denial game, they weren't willing to do, well, anything for me, so what was the point of continuing the relationship? So I didn't.

Breaking off my relationship with them was one of the smartest things I've ever done.

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