The dream I have had most often, since I was young in fact, involves a horrifically violent death in a car.  I even wrote a poem about it once, way back on 24th November 1997.  Here it is:

Most Recurring Dream

Silent
Under the shroud of night
Wearing a cloak of blood
Shards of glass scattered about
Trapped in this mechanical tomb
One arm twisted against the window
The other folded into my smashed chest
My final breath a gasp of pain
But not of surprise
Eyes open staring ahead lifelessly
I am wrapped tightly by these blankets of steel
The final sound was metal on metal
Broken at last

Yes, I know that's not exactly pleasant, but what can you do?  The brain comes up with what it comes up with.  Also, of course, driving (or riding) in cars is extremely unsafe, and worse when there are impaired drivers about, which there often are.

It's about that time where I link to a song that is relevant to dreams... how about this one?

That song is great.  Of course, that's not the album with the cover art that most closely matches the particular horrific dream I describe above.  (That would be Do the Collapse, which is probably my personal favorite GBV album.)

Sometimes I wonder if it's a symptom of my depressed state that a dream this macabre would keep turning up again and again.  

Since I'm getting old, I don't remember the first time I started to have dreams in languages other than English.  Suffice it to say that is was a very long time ago.  If I were to guess, I would say I was probably in high school.  For a year in high school, thanks to an exchange student from Ankara who arrived only being able to speak Turkish and French, and another exchange student from Northern France, I spoke French just about every day.  In fact, it was awhile before I bothered speaking English to these particular students... after all, they had to learn enough of it first to be conversant, and though my French was certainly not good, it was good enough that I could have a conversation... ah, but I am off topic.  The topic is dreams.

I love so much about this song by the way.  The bass slides in the turnaround after the first chorus, yes.  The subtle distorted guitar that comes and goes, which I especially like in the second verse.  That arpeggio that plays during the verses.  The strings.  The way the feel of agitation grows, then releases.  Thom's falsetto.  

I don't personally have very many dreams that I would categorize as "nice", but usually when I do, there is plenty of non-English dialogue involved.  It's probably normal for people in our lives to show up in our dreams, and there are plenty of people in my life for whom English is not their native language.  For my dear friends who speak French (like people I write songs about), when they show up in my dreams, they show up speaking French.  For the people I know who speak Spanish, when there is a conversation with them during a dream, it's in Spanish.  

Here's what I wish were a thing:  I wish there was a way to record this stuff.  See, I wonder if my pronunciation and grammar and whatnot is better in dreams than it is in real life.  I feel like it very well might be, as the conscious brain just gets in the way sometimes, you know?

Something about my dreams that I can't figure out... see, I have had dreams where I've come up with an entire movie plot.  Usually I am a neutral observer watching everything happen, like a narrator.  Sometimes I am the protagonist.  None of these are happy movies.  There is generally some kind of horrific tragedy, a great deal of tears, and sometimes complete dystopia.  Kind of scary what my subconscious is trying to say.

As an aside, this is an old catchy song, but has anyone actually paid attention to the lyrics?  I mean, I think they're kind of awful.

I've always kind of wanted to write a novel.  Maybe that's what my brain is doing while I sleep, trying to write a novel as best as it can with images?

Sometimes people show up in my dreams who I don't necessarily think about every day.  These are not always actual people, occasionally they are fictional. For instance, I have had dreams where Jimmy keeps on complaining about only getting the one take of this song:

It's a B-side, so no big deal, but he's kind of hard to reason with.

My brother shows up in my dreams fairly often, which is odd because he died in December 1998. Sometimes he is the same age he was then. Sometimes he is bald and wrinkled, which would seem to indicate he managed to age faster than me. At any rate, he's not exactly on my mind daily, except for maybe in my subconscious.

Other folks who make recurring cameos: random teachers from junior high and high school, musicians, Tom Glavine, Jesse Owens,  and that crooked cop from Casablanca.

I suffer from terrible insomnia.  Unless I am really jet lagged or physically worn out, getting to sleep is a struggle.  Simply, I can't turn my brain off.  I think about this, about that, about things that matter, about things that really don't matter, over and over and over and over.  When I am eventually able to sleep, my brain keeps right on churning. Enter dreams.

You might think this topic is just an excuse to reference songs about dreams... and well, you wouldn't be 100% wrong...

Let's keep this first installment musical.  Sometimes, I dream lyrics.  Here are some that I wrote down after waking up at a crazy early hour:

wrap me up in the rabble of the crowd that's had enough

I have no idea what that means.  I am certain there were other words around these, but when I woke up in that not-quite-coherent state, these are the only ones I could focus on enough to actually write down.  Good enough to keep, yes.  Good enough to write around, maybe.  Maybe another dream will bring me more lyrics to finish out this idea.

Sometimes I dream complete songs.  I mean, completely written and arranged.  Intro, verse, chorus, bridge, chord progressions, cool bass lines.  The conscious version of me who is typing this blog entry right now wonders how many of these are just popular songs that we all know, but recycled.  There is a part of me that thinks there might actually be something in there though.  Sadly, I generally never remember enough of the music upon waking to do anything with it... I say "generally", because there is an exception.  It's a song that is now called "Never Let Go".  I'll hold back additional commentary on that for a future blog post.

When I think about this further, I think that I might actually write better songs in my sleep than I do when I'm awake.  Yeah, that sounds like a pithy hyperbole, but I am afraid it may be true.  That part of me that is overly self-critical, the part of me that never thinks anything is ever good enough, the part of me that writes with chord charts handy... those parts aren't there when I'm sleeping.  Maybe the music I hear in my dreams is where my true creativity is?