“The Meaning”

This blog is fifth in a five-part series titled “The Dream”, a write-up I did of a very vivid dream I had. Even though it wasn't specifically about the Disease, the dream’s subject—feeling  different, inhuman—is something all those of us who suffer from addiction can relate to.

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When I woke up, I had music in my mind--the theme from a movie a friend of mine and I had gone to see the night before. I don’t know how much of the dream was influenced by that movie, or the microwaved dinner I’d had afterwards, but it was powerful, and I still feel the emotion of being there in that dream-space, where everything seems so real.

These people were my kin; I belonged to them, with them. They were the broken part of myself, the part that feels inhuman, that something went wrong when my soul was placed into this earthly body and sent to walk this reality. They were my fears about never being accepted, or able to find love, or that the love I find won’t be interested in me.

I read once in a book that all the world around us, all of reality, is merely a dream. All the images we see, all the sensations we experience, are all an illusion. But the feelings we have from experiencing it and the beauty we see, those things are not imaginary. The image is a dream, but the beauty is real.

“The Memorials”

This blog is fourth in a five-part series titled “The Dream”, a write-up I did of a very vivid dream I had. Even though it wasn't specifically about the Disease, the dream’s subject—feeling  different, inhuman—is something all those of us who suffer from addiction can relate to.

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By the time the party had come to an end, the sun had risen and it was the next morning. I walked through the surrounding woods with one of the other guys, [dude]. There, among cedar and pine trees, he showed me the memorials from previous years' parties. It was a graveyard of sorts, a place of remembrance.

Laid out one right next to another in long rows were miniature, condensed versions of the previous parties. Fifteen by twenty feet in size, each was bordered by two-by-fours half-buried in the ground. Two small globes, fist-sized, were in the middle of each, spaced about six or seven feet apart. Each memorial looked like an overcrowded diorama, but with no background. Everything about the party--all the people, the buildings, places, and the events--were contained there in miniature form in that modest space. They were snapshots, three-dimensional cartoonish versions of the whole of each affair, abridged and combined into a single, captured moment. I could sense that everything that had taken place at each party had been recorded--saved like a file, if you will--by the two small globes.

As we walked slowly down the rows, I could see the people in the dioramas who’d been at the parties, their faces set with looks of joyous celebration, having the time of their lives just as we’d had. We came across one for which the memorial was blank, and I frowned. The space was there, but no figures--only pine needles and the dirt of the forest floor.

“What happened that year?” I asked [dude]. He replied simply.

“We tore it down.”

“Why?”

“Too crazy, wild; out of hand.”

He was dismissive but sad and I, too, felt the loss of the absent memory. I realized I was beginning to mourn the passing of this year’s celebration. I’d had so much fun, such a good time. I’d shared in something special.

We continued walking. Occasionally, there would be another missing diorama. I don’t know exactly how many we passed; dozens and dozens, at least. It was like walking past generations of gravestones. In time, I saw the emergence of the people I had spent my evening and night with. They appeared first as children, and then with each year their exuberant faces, smiling and laughing, got older.

Making a turn, we looked back at the row parallel to where we’d been walking. A blank plot was there. The two fist-sized globes at the center had started glowing, and pieces from the world around me began shrinking, being folded into this year’s headstone as the ‘file’ was created. I realized that even the forest we walked in would become part of this year’s memorial; it was merely the setting of the party, the unused basic land background for it. And it didn’t really exist any more than anything else did.

[Woman] was there; I’m not sure how long she had been. Perhaps she was following me and [dude], keeping her distance behind us, watching me as I absorbed the magnitude of the graveyard and the immensity of what it represented. The weight of her crush on me showed in her face, and she asked me what was wrong, seeing the frustration on mine.

I confided to her about how I’d met so many people, and so many women I’d been interested in, and yet unable to do anything about it. I think I was trying to talk about how the whole world around us was literally vanishing. But she could sense what I was really saying--that I had let opportunities pass me by. I had been too timid to make a play, put myself out there and go for who I wanted. As much as I had opened up during the night, enjoyed myself, let myself relax and just be, I hadn’t been able to let go of that last bit of insecurity.

I don’t recall the exact words of her reply. Maybe she tried to comfort me, maybe she tried to tell me that it was my problem, not hers, but she cut herself off in the middle and retreated away from me, wounded, unable to contain her sadness at our not being together. The pain of the hurt I’d now caused her added to my sense of loss.

“The People”

This blog is third in a five-part series titled “The Dream”, a write-up I did of a very vivid dream I had. Even though it wasn't specifically about the Disease, the dream’s subject—feeling  different, inhuman—is something all those of us who suffer from addiction can relate to.

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The party raged on, but stayed true to its good nature. No fights broke out. No egos clashed. I’d been watching the women there all night, and definitely noticing some more than others. It was clear that I’d caught a few eyes as well.

Some of the women were more aggressive with their affections than others. Crossing into another room, I got grabbed from behind by one. She turned me around and started kissing me. I enjoyed it until it became clear she wasn’t a woman at all, but a man in the process of becoming one--and yet there was more to it than just that, a more that I couldn’t put into words or explain just yet. And as startling as all that was, it was nothing compared to what more was to come.

Soon after, I found myself encouraging one of the other guys to make his move on a gal he fancied. He declined and then confided in me about why he couldn’t get together with her. He lifted his hand and showed me his deformed fingers--like claws, with several additional digits protruding further up his arm. He wasn’t angry with me, but bitter and embarrassed at my trying to convince him there wasn’t a problem when there so clearly was. I hadn’t even known about his deformity.

There was a gal there, [woman], who had practically never left my side all night. She was crushing on me pretty hard and why I wasn’t interested in her, I don’t recall. I made a few more attempts to hook up. Each failed for one reason or another, all of them because the other person was flawed in some way, in some way not exactly human or ‘normal’. Then the veil fell and I saw with new eyes.

Something was wrong with everyone there. Each of them was in some way inhuman. They were outcasts, freaks who weren’t accepted in life because of their differences. They weren’t human, and yet somehow were, as though they were some other kind of beings who had been forced to be humans. For whatever reason, something had gone wrong with each of them. Something had gone wrong when they were created as humans, but were nevertheless trapped in that state. They were a clan of sorts, and had been around as long as humanity had.

This was their party, the one they held once every year, where they could get together and enjoy just being without the pressure or feelings of judgment. It was the time and place for them to let go and forget about all the horrors of their lives, even though to any other human being, they were seen as the horrors. They created the place for the party themselves each year, created it outside of space and outside of time, on another plane of existence. Here, they didn’t have to hide. But, as I saw in my friend with the deformed hand, the habit of doing so stayed with them, even here.

“The Party”

This blog is second in a five-part series titled “The Dream”, a write-up I did of a very vivid dream I had. Even though it wasn't specifically about the Disease, the dream’s subject—feeling  different, inhuman—is something all those of us who suffer from addiction can relate to.

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I made friends quickly, and everyone there was friendly to me. They accepted me, embraced me, wanted to get to know me and have me join in and celebrate with them. This was not a party where people sulked in the shadows. Everyone was part of the joy, the fun. And it was authentic; no one there just pretended to have a good time or put on airs, fronting for the sake of appearances. Everyone belonged and everyone participated.

It was easy for me to get swept up in it. I stopped worrying about what the others thought, these strangers who had welcomed me to their very special event. I let go of my fear of what might happen if I let go. I let myself be a part of.

No matter what was going on, I joined in. Music was played and performed. It took a little prodding, but I got up and sang with the others, ultimately singing a song or two solo. Somehow there was a way for me to share my own music with them. It was embraced as well--not as some great achievement above and beyond the other music, but as a deeply cherished piece of the greater whole. I had brought my real self to the party, was sharing the deepest parts of me, and that was what was celebrated--the communion, honest and deep and true. We were Dionysian revelers, celebrating celebration with our fullest selves.

“The House In The Woods”

This blog is first in a five-part series titled “The Dream”, a write-up I did of a very vivid dream I had. Even though it wasn't specifically about the Disease, the dream’s subject—feeling  different, inhuman—is something all those of us who suffer from addiction can relate to.

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It was a party, a huge bash. Not just a party, but the annual celebration which was held for no other reason or cause than the occasion itself. I had been invited, or asked to be there, or brought along--I’m not sure; when the dream began, I was already there and it was already happening all around me. It was dark out, and I knew we would be going all through the night.

We were at a house in the woods, far away from any distracting influences. The house wasn’t large, but it was big enough for the fifty or so of us. I assume there were folks hanging out outside, but I can’t tell you what the house looked like because I spent almost all my time inside it.

I knew there was no one around for miles, though. We were far removed from any other people, out where we wouldn’t bother others and they couldn’t bother us. In fact, now that I think back on it, I’m fairly certain there were no other people, period, just myself and those there at the party. There weren’t any other buildings, either, only the people and the party at the house in the woods. Nothing else existed.

There wasn’t anything significant about the people there. No particular overall detail stands out to me, except maybe that almost all of them seemed to be around my age. Perhaps there were children and elderly people, but I don’t remember any. There were men, women. They may have been of multiple races, I don’t know; it didn’t seem important. We were all there and we were all just a group of good folk having one hell of a good time.