I dreamed the other night that Greg grew very tall – perhaps 6’4″ or 6’6″ or something – which, obviously, enraged me.
It was one in a series of vivid dreams I’ve been having lately. Because… I don’t know why. Perimenopause? My chemical imbalance? Blue Moon beer? A change in barometric pressure? Bad theology? The proliferation of British television programmes? Sleep, finding a new way to mock me besides the usual withholding of quality time together? What causes these things, anyway? And, more importantly, what do they mean?
‘Cause geez. These dreams are weird. And I wake up feeling feelings. Which makes it difficult to, you know, continue to function like person capable of maintaining the illusion she’s not crazy.
“You seem mad, Beth. Are you mad? Why are you mad? Are you mad at me?”
“Yes, Greg. I’m mad. At you. Because you were tall, you jackass.”
I dreamt the other night that I made sandwiches with Ree Drummond, the Pioneer Woman.
They were beautiful, color-rich sandwiches with precisely stacked layers of veggies and thin, accordion piles of deli meat. They were assembled according to blueprints provided by Ree, but with a whimsy that made them look casual, hospitable and endearingly haphazard.
We had to make 74 sandwiches, but, to get to the barn where the sandwich assembly was taking place, we had to trek a mile through the pasture, and my boots kept getting lodged in deep mud, suctioned such that every attempt to dislodge them made enthusiastic farting sounds.
And then I cut the sandwiches wrong, so we had to start over.
I thought we were supposed to cut the sandwiches like this.
Obviously, that’s a napkin and not a sandwich. Who has time to make real sandwiches?? Not me.
But then Ree explained we needed 2/3 sandwiches. As in, we had to cut out a triangle approximately 1/3 the size of the sandwich, leaving 2/3 in tact. This was, she assured me gently, the correct way to cut a sandwich.
And even though she was nice about it, I was embarrassed. I mean, I’m a 40 year old mother of 5, and I don’t know how to cut a sandwich. I woke up sad.
I dreamed two friends moved to Arizona, so we had to move, too, but I didn’t know how to blend Northwest dark woods with Southwest patterns. I kept sobbing and saying that, if Ellen DeGeneres can make modern art and a love of nature work in her office, surely I could find a way to bring the western regions together. I woke up panicked and sweaty.
And the night after I posted that piece about being a Christian and an LGBTQ ally, I dreamt I wore a neon green hulu skirt, my grandmother’s pearls, and a waist-length Ariel the Mermaid wig to a speaking engagement, at which I discovered I had a pitcher of margaritas and a debilitating case of laryngitis.
Someone help me.
I need an interpreter.
What do these dreams MEAN?
If you tell me, I will send you a sandwich. Like, not a real sandwich, but definitely a napkin cut like a sandwich. Or a postcard with dotted “cut here” lines so you can practice sandwich cutting. SERIOUSLY. I’m on a Need to Know here, folks.
Help me.
26 responses to “I Dreamed Dreams. HELP ME.”
About 6 months ago I started taking Celexa becuase I was having trouble sleeping and was suffering from anxiety attacks when bedtime came around. It has gotten rid of the anxiety and helped me in a lot of other ways as well but the dreams, oh my goodness the dreams! I couldn’t even begin to explain and they are always so vivid and stay with me for days.
I am dying of laughter! So glad someone else has weird dreams too. My husband’s a good interpreter of mine (when he’s not laughing at me!) Will ask him what he thinks… 😉
Well, I’m almost a week late to this party. I suppose everyone else has gone home by now. But jic anyone is still lurking around, sweeping up popped balloons, swigging their kid’s last hooch of 7-Up, I am writing FOUR daily pieces about Interpreting One’s Own Dreams, over at my website. Thanks, Beth, for your funny post and question that have bothered me for a week…
They mean you are very tired and your brain really wants to be creative and adventurous.. but no one has time for that! lol!
You know, I can’t possibly tell you what all of it means. But I can point out that you remembered to bring the margaritas, that has to count for something good.
No dream interpretation here. HOWEVER, I may have a handle on another issue you have written about. Let me explain.
I do not dream. Ever. Or at least, very rarely. But my HUSBAND, he does. And when he dreams he talks in his sleep. To the people around him. It is AWESOME. For example, one night my daughter had crawled into bed and burrowed into The Middle. A couple of hours later my husband sat straight up, glared over at us, and started yelling. The conversation went a little something like this:
Dad: ABIGAIL! KNOCK IT OFF!
Abigail: What?
Dad: Stop it Abi! I mean it!
Me: What are you talking about? She was SLEEPING.
Dad: No! NO she was NOT! She was PANTING LIKE A DOG.
Abigail: *starts to giggle*
Me (trying to contain laughter): She was WHAT?
Dad: She was PANTING like a DOG! A DOG!
Me: Yeah, NO. What you heard? That was THE DOG.
At which point, Abigail and I COLLAPSED into giggles. Dad rolled over in a huff and went back to sleep. The BEST part: he remembered NOTHING in the morning, which makes it so much funnier, you know?
SO, here’s what I’m thinking. If you TALK in your sleep while dreaming, it may explain why you always have children in your bed. It’s VERY, VERY amusing. Just a thought…
🙂
New vitamins? B vitamins make me dream crazy, vivid dreams . . .
My therapist (not that you necessarily want to take advice from the girl with a therapist…) says that dreams just represent things we’re worried about or trying to work out in our minds. They don’t always make sense and they don’t predict the future. They just show us that we’re working through some stuff.
I believe that dreams are one of the ways God speaks to us. Look at all the dreams & interpretations in the bible! Why would God suddenly stop talking like that? I have 2 or 3 WEIRD dreams most nights. Yay. Most go uninterpreted, but the ones I do figure out are POWERFUL and sometimes life changing. Of course you’ve got to be careful when looking into dream interpretation, cause there’s lots of super weird stuff out there. We have a great book here in Australia called The Divinity Code by Adrian Beale & Adam F Thompson. I know there are other good books out there too, but don’t know what they are sorry. Happy dream interpreting!
Last week I dreamed that I was in the Dentist’s chair, and we were finished and she told me to go ahead and spit. And I did. In real life. I woke myself up because I spit. I still giggle recalling it. And I’m ever so thankful it wasn’t a pee dream. And so is my husband.
Greg becoming tall could mean he is exerting some power over you that you resent, the 74 sandwiches sliced into 1/3 and 2/3 pieces might mean you have a math issue to solve- maybe you are secretly upset about core math, AND it means you’ll be a guest on Ree’s show to show people some fun sandwiches! The two friends moving… could mean you miss your friends and need to go on vacation with them soon, maybe to Arizona?!
I’m disappointed by your failure to work in the farting mud.
Because I’m waiting for someone smarter than I am to interpret that aspect.
Mmm, true. I think that means she doesn’t want to be on t.v., so she’s dragging her feet on that one, but is none-the-less trudging toward it…
My medication + hormone fluctuations = crazy, crazy dreams. You too, maybe?
My kids are looking at me even more askance than usual because I could not suppress my giggles reading this post. Thanks for getting my day off to a great start 🙂
Heeeee hee hee! Thanks for the giggles. Lately I’ve been too tired to dream, but I vividly remember one time where I dreamed I was being assaulted and I kneed my poor husband quite viciously, who woke me up crying, “What did I do? What did I do?!”
Okay, can I have 1/3 of a sandwich for doing just this?
“I posted that piece about being a Christian and an LGBTQ ally, I dreamt I wore a neon green hulu skirt, my grandmother’s pearls, and a waist-length Ariel the Mermaid wig to a speaking engagement, at which I discovered I had a pitcher of margaritas and a debilitating case of laryngitis.”
As I replied to Kristin Howerton’s post on Christians hammering on LBGT ‘sin’, for reasons that seem unsupported compared to all the other sins listed in the Bible..the interpretation of this dream is the punchline of the oldest therapy joke in the world: “and the therapist replies, ‘What was the subconscious part?’ ”
So uh, Beth…about your dream. First, you articulate your innermost vision of what Christ came to give us: Love. For reasons not well supported by the Gospel, some of your co-religionists are flipping their lids about this statement. In your dream, you then appear to accept a longed-for honor, dressed inappropriately and unable to speak coherently or be heard. What was the subconscious part?
Oooh… well played, Alex King. Well played. You’re hired as Dream Interpreter. That’s worth a whole entire sandwich.
No answer either, just lots of weird dreams, too. I had one last night in which I flew with my husband and two year old to Germany, where I have family (and have been wanting to go again for years now) but couldn’t bring the baby for some reason. Then, about ten minutes after we got there, I decided I couldn’t be gone from the baby that long because she’s still nursing, so I had to get a flight back right then, without the guys, neither of whom speak much German or know my family. The only way I could get back early was to use a ticket pilfered from someone who was missing the flight. I got the ticket of a man twenty years older than me who was unable to speak and flew this route regularly, and I had to impersonate him well enough that no one could tell I was someone else. And then a girl, thinking I was him, started telling me about how in love she was with me (him), and then I couldn’t even get back to the baby. The ridiculous thing is that the baby was nursing in reality the whole time.
Dude. You have cool dreams.
No insights on that one, but like wow man.
Maybe you’re pregnant 🙂
NOT pregnant. Although I often feel the baby move.
OMG, me too! I swear sometimes I’ll be like, “Awwww, the baby just kicked!” But I haven’t been pregnant in 2 years. .__.
My dreams have been vivid and stressful too lately. Like, you wake up more exhausted than when you fell asleep. Which is really the biggest God prank EVER, I mean, seriously cruel to mothers. Since my sister is getting married and we’re doing everything as cheaply as possible, I’m having dreams about showing up on the day of the wedding with stuff half done, or not done, or having forgotten to invite people.
My favorite dream of ALL TIME though, is when I was a dragon. I didn’t own a dragon, or see a dragon, I WAS a dragon. Flying was awesome, but then I had to fight another dragon in a basement and it was very cramped and I couldn’t figure out how to get away without hurting the other dragon (apparently as a dragon I am still a pacifist) and started crying dragon tears. Anyone know the meaning of dreaming that you’re non-human?
My husband and I are going to a friend’s wedding next month. I am SUPER excited as we are getting a sitter and leaving the kids OVER NIGHT. It is a freaking miracle that we can do this and the closer it gets, the more excited I am. I think I’m more excited than the bride, lol. So what does my subconscious do? Give me nightmares about it.
I had a dream the groom died so instead of a wedding, we went to a funeral. But of course they decided to have the funeral at the reception hall and the DJ didn’t get the message and there was this awful sorrow during all of the typical happy wedding things. Then I dreamt that I had to get back to the kids while at the wedding, but everything conspired to keep me from getting to them. This is actually a pretty common nightmare for me. It is often very vivid and the panic associated with not being able to get to my kids is very real. Then I can’t get back to sleep. Sigh. At least I know why it’s happening.
Ha! I can’t interpret for you, but if you run across that person, I have a couple recent ones that I’d like done too! I have tornadoes, electric greenish clouds and hot lava. I’ve also had some strange happy ones that don’t make sense, ones where I try to predict the future and then I dream about my dream coming true. So, I’m all messed up too. Maybe we should start a dream support group. Wait. We just. did. Thanks!
Oh man, I am in the same boat, crazy weird dreams that leave me “feeling” them all day.
Though, I recently heard a report on NPR or something that was saying that dreaming may be a way to organize your experiences from the day, since then when I have a crazy dream I try to think of what happened the day before that could morph, Alice in Wonderland style, into what ever I was treated to that night. Often I can find some thing that happened, something I heard, or something I did that contorted itself into my strange dream, unfortunately sometimes I still can’t and those are the days I fear for my long-term sanity…