THAT DAY

I'm building the World Dream Bank. Work all day, relentlessly. Edit twenty or more dreamtales--all eleven in my small-press book Birth Dreams, then comb the rest of June '93, then most of July.

Take some breaks to eat, stretch, read, but... I really overdid it. Up late. Can't do this! This isn't a college paper where I can pile up sleep-debt and catch up on the holidays. This is the holiday--the Long Hauliday. To build this thing, I have to read and judge ten thousand more dreams. I'd better pace.

THAT NIGHT

Mom bursts in my bedroom, eager to nag. She drags a bag of used clothes she's sure I'll wear-- toddler jumpsuits, little-girl princess gowns, a leaning stack of baggy pants for geezers built like tanks, not lanky me, all checkered hideous. Litter my floor like seaweed plaid festooning a beach after Typhoon Burpo the Clown. Mom declares "No one cares about your stupid dreams, they're worthless. Get a job!" Absently, she adds "Your trouble's all in your jeans." I think she means "You're sex-obsessed, like all you men." Like dad? She's the one who's sex-obsessed, always & again warning my cock oppresses dates, sisters, friends. She clarifies. She means genes! "Ugh, your dad's heritage! That whole family's just weak." "Then why did you marry in? I didn't pick either you OR him!" She stomps out. Castoffs litter my room. Thanks, mom! I, half-dad weakling, ponder my gene-doom: inferiority. In sails my painting teacher Verity. Not a word. She sits on my head. Ow! Not a bird. Stone bones! Verity intones "All that your mother tells yoooou is truuuuue." I'm getting a smidgen annoyed now. Verity, too?

WHAT'S IT ALL MEAN?

• My mom, then my painting teacher: My mom's a painter too. So rather than get too Freudian about family stuff (and it's there; my dad died earlier this year, so my mom's going a little wacko right now) I suspect this dream's about art! And these twin art-authorities may not really be mad about the content of this insane website of dreams I'm building, but my process: I overworked. Grossly. No wonder I dreamed Verity sat on me! I do feel squashed. By art.
• ACTION: Rest and pace. Don't assume deep family issues are the core problem till I've rested up--overwork is the only clear sabotage here! Yes, my inner mom's a nag, but... my art-mentor's the one who made my head hurt!

2018

Now, years later, I know I do have a genetic weakness--just not the character-weakness my mom implied. I have Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, a rare mutation damaging my collagen. Weakness, easy bruising, headaches, dislocations, gluten intolerance, a weak immune system, AND Asperger syndrome--IQ off the scale, but strange senses and limited social tolerance.

But we Aspies do love our work! In a neurotypical human, a huge crazy project like a library of a thousand dreams might signal neurosis, avoiding some other problem. But for an Aspie, it's kinda... normal. These days I just go with the creative flow. Just try to pace it--rest, stretch, remember to eat. And in 2000, I often didn't.

Until this dream. I did pace myself better, and the nag-dreams faded. Sorry, mom, didn't even look for a dayjob, just did my art. Over the next year, I built the World Dream Bank. Millions of readers later, my mom looks wrong about that.

Thanks, O Gentle Reader, O No One, for caring about my stupid dreams.

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