Sunday 31 May 2015

Dream 449

'Avocados & Queues'
Dream date: 30 May 2015
I was in a supermarket, reaching up to a shelf which was slightly above my head. I was choosing avocados, trying to find the ripest ones. The skin on some of the avocados was removed and the flesh was getting all over my hands, but this was not strange to me in the dream. The avocados were quite a lot bigger than the typical ones we buy in UK supermarkets.

There was a scene with my cousin HM, and my mum's friend, CC. I cannot recall what was happening, but I was jealous of my cousin, HM for some reason. There was a small white object involved.

I was then in a school or some other learning environment. The class was made up of various people known to me - some of them from high school, some from university etc, as well as random dream characters. I walked out of the school and found myself in a rainy environment at night. It looked like a parking lot or some other industrial area in a city, and was near a concrete subway/underpass. I saw some people walk into the underpass and wondered where I had seen this before (so my dream mind seemed to be searching for a real-life waking memory perhaps). I stood outside for a moment, thinking, and then thought I had better go back inside. As I entered the school/learning establishment again, it felt like the location - which was a school hall - was a composite of my primary school hall (the doorway to the left of the 'stage') and Congregation Hall in my university - which is used for examinations and also graduation ceremonies, and has a main room with a stage in it also. The stage was carved out of dark brown wood in my dream. 

The other students were all assembled in lines - according to the colour of uniforms they were wearing. All the uniforms were the same - a baseball cap, a short-sleeved shirt and a pair of trousers, but the colours were: black, blue, red, green. I realised I had gone outside to decide what colour my uniform was (although, when outside I hadn't actually even been aware I was wearing a uniform; never thought about colours or decisions about colours; and wasn't even aware we were going to be lining up according to the colour of our uniforms anyway. The reason for me going outside was therefore not only given to me in retrospect, but was also inaccurate. I couldn't quite tell if my uniform was black or blue (the blue was a slightly grey shade), but I then realised it was black and I joined the queue of people in the black uniforms. We were handed a form to complete. Everyone started to leave the hall, but I decided that I should fill the form in while there, and then submit it. I went to a windowsill to lean on, and started to fill out the form, but there was a section I did not understand. 

I walked out of the hall and went past the male toilets, which were just opposite, across the corridor. In the doorway of the toilets was PR, a boy I went to school with, and some who is incredibly unattractive to me. He was the first boy who ever kissed me (when I was 13 years old) and I did not enjoy the experience. It happened in a dark cupboard during a game at my friend's birthday party. PR said something to me and I realised I did not want to stop and speak to him. 

I decided to get help in completing my form, and saw the teacher of the class was standing at a desk in the middle of the hall I had just left. I went back in and approached her. She was eating a large sandwich in what looked like a massive burger bun - the bread was covered in sesame seeds and there was salad inside, which I saw when she put the sandwich down on the desk, which was covered in paperwork. I realised it was Mary Berry, the television presenter and baking expert. I asked her how to fill out the remaining section on the form. She took the form off me, bent it slightly (it was several pages long and white, black and orange in colour - I saw this now). The question was on page 2 of the form, and looked like a question with a box for an answer. However, as soon as Mary Berry started to explain what I needed to do, it looked like a very fuzzy, grainy printed black and white image. She pointed at the image and said: 'When you get home, take a fine tooth comb and try and find the hidden message'. She demonstrated this, by running her finger slowly and methodically over the image - as if checking it carefully bit-by-bit. 

I took the form from her and walked away, feeling the burden of having to complete it. I wondered if I should go out that night, or go home and sort out the form. I wondered if I could be bothered to get dressed up for a night out. I also wondered if there would be anything to do on a Thursday night (I knew at this point of the dream that I was actually in Sheringham).

There was a scene in my nan's house with my mum (evening/night still) - it may have involved the form being completed, but I cannot remember any details about this dream scene.

TIME: 01:00 - 10:00 hours (I do not know when this dream took place)
LUCIDITY: No
SPECIAL NOTES: I smoked some cannabis shortly before I went to sleep

Dreamsigns:
  • The school hall was a composite of two halls in a previous and a current learning establishment (IA - Inner Awareness/F - Form)
  • Mary Berry was my teacher (C - Context)
  • The realisation I was in Sheringham was contradicted by the fact that I saw a subway/underpass in the dream scene - there are none in Sheringham. The subway/underpass reminded me of one that is in Norwich on St Stephen's Street (IA - Inner Awareness/F - Form)

Recurrent Dream Themes:
  • Classroom or learning institution

Potential Day/Dream Residue:
  • The day of this dream I mentioned avocados, and the day after this dream, I bought avocados as the dream left me with a craving for some.
  • The day before this dream I had thought that I very rarely ever dream of rain or bad weather - mostly my dreams are sunny daylight or dark - with some daylight dreams where the sky is grey and overcast. I cannot recall the last dream I had where there was heavy rain. The day of this dream I also asked DL if he had ever had a dream in which it was raining - he said he had. 
  • The friend (NN) whose birthday party I went to - where PR kissed me in the cupboard - came up in conversation between me and my mum the day before this dream.
  • The day before this dream I was watching television and heard the voiceover announce that Mary Berry would be a guest star on a forthcoming TV show.
  • The day before this dream DL and I had been discussing what you could use for a burger bun in a no-carb challenge - inspired by a task set on Masterchef Australia.
  • Shortly before I went to sleep and had this dream, my friend LD2 called me and tried to persuade me to go out clubbing in a gay bar he and my other friends were drinking in. I was far too tired to go out and it was already very late.

Waking Thoughts & Emotions:
I did not have any strong waking thoughts or emotions, other than a sense that the dream scenes involving the school were weird because my memory and reasoning seemed quite weird - instead of there being much action in this dream (there was very little), the overwhelming feeling was that I spent a lot of the dream in thought or trying to remember something (I woke up 'remembering' that I was trying to access my waking memory in the dream, but I am not sure how this would have been experienced in the actual dream). 

The only way I can describe this is the (imagined, rather than scientifically accurate) concept of having two memory systems (one in waking life, one in dreams) which act independently of one another, but can be accessed in either state (so when awake, I can remember my dreams, and when in a dream, I can access my waking memories - particularly as a lucid dreamer). However, in this situation it feels like information was flowing between both memory systems while in the dream state - and after waking - making me confused as to where each memory came from (my waking reality, or the dream reality) and whether it was a 'real' or 'dream' memory. I think this is the result of being a lucid dreamer and training myself to question the reality of dreams by enhancing my cognitive and 'fact-checking' skills whilst in the dream state (an important part of learning how to do DILDS - dream initiated/induced lucid dreams). 

The phrase: 'When you get home, take a fine tooth comb and try and find the hidden message' really stands out from this dream. I wonder if it is a message from the subconscious linked specifically to dreaming? I had a discussion about dream interpretation a few days before this dream and had outlined the approach I take, which is Freudian and based on subjective subconscious associations between waking memories, thoughts, feelings and experiences which are symbolised within the dream narrative.

* I have forgotten various parts of this dream. If I recall them, I will record them below.

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