Tag: dream

Peacock Hydrangeas

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“Take me to the land of lovers where flowers bloom with love, birds sing with love, and hearts long for hearts. ”

–Debasish Mridha

I must admit, I have neglected the blog as of late. Part of it has been due to writer’s block, which I struggle with often. But the other part has been life in general, and juggling hobbies. I somehow try to fit music, writing, drawing, and poetry all into a life that is already full of mom and work duties. I make it work, I suppose, but the piano has been winning out a lot lately, much to the chagrin of my guitars.

Then there’s the dreams themselves. I’ve gone into another period of deeply dreaming that is much too personal to share now, if ever.

And now, in the midst of finals week, worn out, and with a tuckered out kiddo passed out in bed, I finally felt I had something easy to share. Something to at least break the silence, anyway. I was actually sitting at the piano, languidly pecking out the notes to a very lazy, half-hearted rendition of “Jingle Bells” when I finally decided to hit the computer keys instead.

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The Blue Serpent

Bria Rose2 Comments

“Just as a snake sheds its skin, we must shed our past over and over again.”

–Gautama Buddha

When I was a little girl, just barely 7 or 8 at the oldest, I met a snake at the local wildlife center during a field trip. I had seen snakes before, and had been told they were dangerous. In fact, many a serpent met its end at the mercy of my grandfather’s garden hoe. My grandmother often spoke of snakes in terms of the biblical snake in the Garden.

“Never trust a snake,” she would say in her thick, French accent, “they are all bad, even if they don’t poison you, they will squeeze you dead! Always stay away from the snakes.”

So at that moment, as the handler came up to me and offered for me to pet the snake, I gazed at it with a little fear, and a whole lot of wonder. That moment may have every well been my first act of rebellion. I remember thinking, just before my fingers shakily reached for the snake’s coils, that it must be so smiley, and oh, how my grandmother would be so upset!

And the surprise that it was not so was even more delightful. Fingertips touched smooth, cool scales, instead of slime. So soft, almost like velvet, with the exception of the slight ridges of each scale. And even more, it did not poison me, or squeeze me dead. Right then, in that moment, I knew that one day, I’d have a snake of my own.

And very soon, that knowing moment will come true. But before then, a snake came to me in a dream …

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Sturgeon Moon

Bria Rose2 Comments

“When the snow falls and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies, but the pack survives.”

–George R. R. Martin

Full moons have always held significance to me, throughout my lifetime. From the awestruck gazes of childhood to the more spiritual tones of my adulthood, I have always made sure to take a few minutes each full moon to acknowledge the beauty of it. There is something pure and good to be seen in that alabaster light. Despite the consensus that the full moon brings out the wild and crazy in people, it has always been a calming, grounding force for me. Then again, I might just be crazy.

Meditation has become a ritual for me at each new and full moon cycle, and this one was no different. Truth be told, I meditate nearly every night before sleep, but without much intent. I allow thoughts to flit here and there through my mind until I nod off to sleep. With these moon meditations, however, I try to put some purpose or intent into it. Usually some sort of letting go, or goal. And since I haven’t written about a dream in some time, I thought I would share one from this most recent full moon.

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The Glass Chapel

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For where God built a church, there the Devil would also build a chapel.

–Martin Luther

I must confess that as of late, I have been more the meditative soul than the dreamer. This has been due in part to a two week long battle with the flu, the resulting medications of which continually knocked me into dreamless and fitful slumber instead of my normal nightly wanderings. What dreams have come between have also been, frankly, too personal to share.

After what has seemed like forever, my brain has returned to its routine and my midnight mental conjurings are beginning to return again. The first dream since my febrile fight (during which I somehow managed to successfully write 3 lengthy posts about mourning!) came to me in the dark delirium of a Friday night, and boy it felt good to be back!

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The PICC Line

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Cancer’s life is a recapitulation of the body’s life, its existence a pathological mirror of our own.

–Dr. Siddhartha Mukherjee, The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer

When it comes to cancer, I am no stranger. Diagnosed with neuroendocrine carcinoid cancer at age 21, I know the terror and disbelief that comes with hearing the words “you have cancer”. I was fortunate in that my tumor was caught early enough, and surgical intervention cured me of the mass that threatened to engulf my pancreas. Some argue divine intervention on that front, but I just say it’s dumb luck.

Cancer, biologically speaking, has been an indiscriminate killer for as long as cell lines have existed. At any point, any cell in your body can go rogue and become cancerous. In fact, it might happen regularly, but for those with healthy immune systems, the natural killer cells in the body immediately recognize and destroy the abnormal cells. When this system is affected, cancer strikes. I could go on for ages about oncogenesis and the history of cancer, but there are far smarter people who have written many a book on the subject. The Emperor of All Maladies is one of my favorite books on the subject, and was also turned into a solid documentary available on Amazon Prime. I urge you to watch that, and The Way of All Flesh, a documentary about the unsung heroine Henrietta Lacks, for amazing insight into the strides we as a species have made in the battle against cancer.

Leading up to my diagnosis, I had dreams that would ultimately predict the location and size of my cancer, but that’s another story for another day. Tonight, I write about a different dream from two nights ago that has me scratching my head.

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Where Does Paper Come From?

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“If aliens visit us, the outcome would be much as when Columbus landed in America, which didn’t turn out well for the Native Americans.”

— Stephen Hawking

Though I have had vivid dreams for my entire life, writing them down was not commonplace for me until recently. Occasionally, however, a dream would be so epic in scope that I would take the time to jot it down. Such is the case of the first dream I ever wrote out, at age 21. This was also the first dream wherein I experienced actual pain. I guess the saying “pinch me, I’m dreaming!” must not be applicable to all dreams…

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Clockwatching

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“Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and your roses.”

–Oscar Wilde

Though my dreams may seem completely random, there are some rules they tend to follow. For one, I am almost always alone in my dreams. Only those who are very important to me show up in them, and if you appear in multiple dreams? Well I guess you’re pretty darn special to me at that point. On the rare occasion that I dream of someone who I am not close to at all, it strikes me as odd.

Such is the case of a truly strange dream I had of a friend’s friend…

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Call Me Ishmael

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For there is no folly of the beast of the earth which is not infinitely outdone by the madness of men.   -Herman Melville

Hurricane Florence is upon us! Abandon all hope, ye who enter North Carolina! Especially if you were planning to drive I-95. You’ll find the entire state is pretty much closed, please come back later! The storm has been on a slow crawl through our state since the early morning hours of Thursday. Severe flooding has rocked the state, and many hundreds of thousands are still without power today. Flood waters are only expected to rise more over the next couple of days, so we’re not out of the woods just yet, though my area has remained relatively unharmed.

Despite the intensity of the storm, along with it came a silly little dream of me facing down my own veritable white whale…

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