I'm in a strange house-castle-indoor forest! Stone walls, stairs, arches like a castle, but trees growing from cracks in the old stone. Cobwebs and brush. Dark, dirty.

I set out to clean it. Kids watch me. Gossip, but don't help or hinder. Like cleaning's a spectator sport. I don't see why. Gotta be dull.

One girl's cute--huge eyes and black bangs like a mini-Cleopatra. Oh! Cleo from those Monster High kids' movies. I know she's centuries older than she seems, but she looks underage. So I guiltily suppress my attraction to her, and clean on!

A few minutes later, though, I take a break. Leave this muddy indoor wood. Hike up a grassy hill on a path alongside a chainlink fence. At the top, a knot of teens lean on posts by a gap in the fence. Two BEAUTIFUL girls are talking in low voices about... nuclear physics?! Some science project they planned that they hope will lead to a real, profitable invention.

Suddenly I'm shocked to realize I have absolutely no sexual feeling for these girls, and they're as gorgeous and smart as I'll ever find.

Either I firmly believe NO girl I'd like would EVER like me and there's no point in torturing myself... or this year's recurring illness has insidiously drained all sexuality--without my noticing.

How long's it been since I had ANY sexual feelings? Months?

And then I wake--with an erection! Proving it's not medical.

Leaving just one hypothesis: suppression. More than that: delusion. Lying to myself.

NOTES IN THE MORNING

• Cleo from Monster High:
  1. My friend Lori gave me a Cleo doll that I'm currently sculpting into a weird little centaur.
  2. Those bangs... Twilight Sparkle, nerdy star of the My Little Pony shows?
• Two gifted teens: having grown up as a child prodigy, the gifted attract me; but in the dream I'm convinced I have no chance, I'm hopelessly weird to normal girls, what's the point of trying?
  1. One looked like the BBC actress playing young Queen Victoria (definitely gifted); the other looked like Dr Who's current companion, also gifted.
  2. I thought of Tes and her sisters--all biracial, all gifted--in Kate Elliott's Court of Fives, which I'm reading. Like Cleo, Tes can't fit into her stuffy society.
• "I've felt sexless for months..." Whaaat? Just minutes ago I found Cleo hot! And suppressed it as wicked. Did my dream mess with me in revenge for denying the truth earlier?
• Wake with erection, contradicting my dream beliefs! The dream proves my lack of interest isn't medical but suppression. Like that old dream Cold-Shower Conscious. Based on the belief that no one wants me. And some of my sex beliefs are provably delusional--
  1. Physical body's aroused, yet I dream I'm not! What makes this even weirder is that I've known for decades from sleep-lab experiments that nearly any body in the REM state--young/old, fe/male--looks sexually aroused--erectile tissue swollen, heart up, lubrication--even if the dream's nonsexual! Yet here I'm sure of the opposite. Huh?
  2. Lust for Cleo one minute, then "I've felt sexless for months". Whaaat?
• ACTION: look hard at your beliefs. Feelings aren't the problem! Beliefs can stifle your feelings. And when they're provably delusional...

MONTHS LATER

So... I fused that Cleo doll (and the torso & legs of a second doll with a blah face) into a sexy but precocious centaurette.

Should I feel guilty? When the Monster High movies are all about tarting up and dumbing down already? In "New Ghoul at School" and "Boo York", they're maddeningly conformist--just wanna fit in. Grrr. Don't they have ANY intellectual, creative or spiritual interests? OK, in the recent "origin" movie they take initiative--build their own high school! And in Boo York, Luna, Kitty Noir and Pharaoh do care for their art--it's just their music's so banal, their characters so predictable.

Anyway, speaking sculpturally, the Monster High dolls are so distorted and flimsy they can't even stand on their own. But my centaur-sex-kitten version Cleo can. Independence, nyah nyah nyah!

So this is my apology to dream-Cleo for snubbing her. And to a zillion more women I suspect I've lied to over the years, by looking away, pretending I wasn't attracted--wasn't impressed! When I was. As bad as unwanted attention, and more dishonest.

I've learned the price of denial: Cleo's revenge!

World Dream Bank homepage - Art gallery - New stuff - Introductory sampler, best dreams, best art - On dreamwork - Books
Indexes: Subject - Author - Date - Names - Places - Art media/styles
Titles: A - B - C - D - E - F - G - H - IJ - KL - M - NO - PQ - R - Sa-Sk - Sl-Sz - T - UV - WXYZ
Email: wdreamb@yahoo.com - Catalog of art, books, CDs - Behind the Curtain: FAQs, bio, site map - Kindred sites