I Do, We Do by Arnold Mesches

In this dream I voluntarily exchanged my head and face skin with those of another person. I was persuaded to do it by a doctor who was going to operate on this other individual.

We exchanged skins, and I went walking around in public with this new outer identity. I even smoked a pipe because I thought it would be consistent with his character. People looked at me suspiciously. I think they couldn't tell whether it was me or him. I felt uncomfortable and looked down at my blue tennis shoes and realized they would be identified with me. I looked out through the flesh mask that covered my head. I could see pipe tobacco smoke, and I even attended college classes trying to be consistent with his character. Yet somehow I remember wearing my red plaid shirt. I must have been wearing my own clothes.

I played out this role for some time and returned to the doctor to exchange his skin for mine. My worst fears were manifested. He didn't want to give up my skin. I protested. He didn't even look like me. It wasn't my image. All I saw was a white man, average height, short blond hair, almost a 1950s fratemity type. Then I knew he was untrustworthy. The dream ended.

This dream gave me an idea. It really separated the inner and outer self . The idea of your self-portrait being pulled off you like a surfer's wet suit and being replaced by another's self-portrait is almost permanently dividing the self. I will never loan my flesh-head face skin to anyone again. Especially not to a 50s fraternity boy.

And the flesh remained living.

SOURCE: Dreamworks: an Interdisciplinary Quarterly (v.3, no.1, fall 1982, p.26. Note that the image was chosen by the editor to illustrate the dream, but wasn't done by the dreamer or inspired by the dream; it was done by Arnold Mesches the previous year.)

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