I am with my youngest daughter buying food in a grocery store. We stand in the check-out line and we find that the male clerk is cheating us by charging us extra for things we've already paid for. This happens because the person behind us got their order mixed up with ours and we had to move things to a different grocery cart. The clerk is charging $2.00 and $3.00 an item.

I become furious and complain. Then, I grab him and tell him we will tie him up in the bathroom and tickle his naked body with feathers.

Finally I pick him up and fly to the top of the room, which has become like a large ballroom type of place. I can see the fancy decorations on the ceiling.

I swing the guy around by the arm and drop him to the floor from the great height. He splatters into pieces.

From my position in the air, I announce:

NOTES

The source of my anger and complaint was immediately obvious to me upon awakening, and, I felt, was quite justified.

The verse expressed my feeling of the moment succinctly. Interestingly... I had just read about a verse that came to someone in a dream. This may well have triggered the idea to compose my own dream verse without my consciously planning to do so.

--Patricia Garfield

EDITOR'S NOTE

I have a decades-long debate with my inner Garfield about violence in dreams. Why? Dreams like this. She feels, like most Westerners, that dream figures are internal simulations not real people, so how you treat them is your own business. She's pretty clear here that this scene is a response to an injustice in her day life, and I'm willing to accept that she's venting anger and this guy is probably just a symbol of her real target. Probably.

But it doesn't follow that dream figures are always parts of you; most cultures think some (not all) are perceptions of external figures of various kinds--whether spirits, gods, demons, or your snoring neighbors dreaming about you (who tend to get upset if they dream you kill them for petty reasons).

Whoever this checkout-guy is, Garfield fails to notice the dream itself says he's not stealing--it's a mix-up due to another customer's stuff. That implies the waking injustice she's mad about may be more a mixup than malice, too. Regardless, the dream guy's clearly not a thief. I know a buck was worth more in 1970, but still--does a mistaken overcharge really deserve a death sentence?

Be merciful in your dreams. Tie up your enemies naked and tickle them with feathers. It's good family fun. You'll be glad you did.

--Chris Wayan

SOURCE: Creative Dreaming by Patricia Garfield, 1995 ed. (orig.1974), p.75

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-Sh - Si-Sz - T - UV - WXYZ
Email: wdreamb@yahoo.com - Catalog of art, books, CDs - Behind the Curtain: FAQs, bio, site map - Kindred sites