I am awake.
****
Almost instantly my mind turns on. My eyes shoot open. It takes me a moment to notice the high pitch whine emanating from my night stand. As my senses manage to recollect themselves, I reach over and gently hit the snooze button, flicking the alarm switch to the off position in one deft motion. I stare blinking (if that's at all possible) at the clock momentarily. I roll over and fling off the blankets and sheets, swing my legs around, and firmly plant my feet on the carpet. I close my eyes as I lift my body from the bed.
****
I open my eyes. I'm in the kitchen, pouring myself a glass of orange juice. I sit down, and begin to slowly nibble my cheerios.
****
Seconds later I slam down my glass of milk, empty, onto the table. Remnants of an egg shell remain on my plate, the last of its keep washed down with my sweet apple juice. I glance over at the clock on the microwave. The time reads 7:30. My eyes shoot up from the watch on my arm; I've missed my bus to school.
****
I rush up stairs again, and start the shower running. I'll have to be quick this morning. I head into my room to find my books lying open on my desk. A half unwritten paper sits surrounded by half complete math problems. Shoot! I knew I forgot to do... everything... the night before. No matter though, I need to get in the shower before...
****
... honk... honk... honk.... The sound of car horns comes from all around. Don't the drivers realize that honking at the cars in front isn't going to help them go any faster or farther? My mind fusses over the sheer incompetent impatience of my fellow road users, as well as the fact that I too am stuck in traffic and late for school. At least I no longer have to take that stupid bus.
****
I burst through the doors of my class and am met by silence... silence and the soft, frantic scribbling of pens and pencils. The tops of eight dozen heads stare down at me, the faces of my classmates bowed in prayer... but not prayer (though I'm sure some of them may have been)...
****
****
I find myself staring at a blank page. How am I supposed to write a 4 page essay on a book I've never even heard of?
****
At least when this is over I'll get to go the zoo, if my brother ever gets out of the shower that is. He's been in there for hours now.
****
I really hope we don't miss our flight.
****
Two wide, thin, slivers of light pierce through either side of my venetian blinds, slicing through the darkness, casting dim shadows across the walls of my room.
****
It is Saturday morning, and yes, I really am awake.
Such are my dreams always. They are nightmares really. And for some reason it always makes me feel depressed. Why must I always dream of normal life gone awry? Is my imagination dead? Am I so consumed by this mundane day to day life of mine that the most frightening thing my mind can develop is a slightly confusing, non sequitur version of a really shitty day in said mundane life?
Am I the only one? Did Tolkien dream of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit, or merely of forgetting where he left those pages Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit? Does Crichton dream of his Lost World or of simply being lost in this world (or Sir Arthur Conan Doyle for that matter)? Was it Samuel L. Clemens of Mark Twain who dreamt while he slept?
Where are the fantastic monsters, or physics altering events of my childhood dreams? Those wild, strange, almost indescribable.... I can't even bring my brain in its wakeful and alert state to describe what came so naturally as a child.
Knowledge and useless facts have heaved asunder the roots of my creativity. My imagination lies dead, in its place stand reason, logic and cynicism, useful yet depressing tools of adulthood.
2 comments:
So true. As the logical beings we struggle to be, the only time we give in to the mysterious and fulfilling world of our unchecked creativity and imagination is in our dreams, those enigmatic facets of our psyche. And why is it that so often while we’re awake, it feels as if we’re dreaming? Most people claim that dreams have a surreal quality – at least the parts we can remember by the time we wake. But I think dreams may be more real than we think. The problem lies in the detail that near the end of the dream, when we are beginning to regain consciousness and enter the waking world, that consciousness – our waking mind – alters the dream, warps it, to make it seem surreal when we finally wake up. But maybe the parts we can’t remember – the deep parts – make much more sense. And when we’re awake, those moments when we feel as if we’re dreaming are the realest parts of our waking lives. It is at those moments when our living, walking selves slip into the realness of something our subconscious remembers from a dream. Only for a moment. And then it's gone.
sounds like your dreams are pretty creative. any observation, reflection or contemplation is an act of creativity. you have lots of those, and often they are quite profoud.
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