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Guardian Movie Stars
Dec. 2nd, 2002 11:34 amYes, you read that right. It comes from the TV show Designing Women, and it's relevant because I had a really weird dream last night.
St. Joan saw saints: Margaret, Catherine, and the Virgin, if I remember correctly. These days we don't know saints anywhere near as well, but we read all about movie stars. Everywhere. I watch old movies a lot. Trust me, I'm not saying I was touched by the supernatural. However, I'm wondering if the same type of dream would have presented itself differently were I not going through a crisis in faith or had I lived in an earlier time.
Bits of the dream were very disturbing, and the farther I get from it the less I remember. So, amateur psychologists have at it.
I was at a large facility -- conference center, hotel, something -- and there's a large conference going on. It appears to be political, but it may be academic.
Side note. Every once in awhile I get these flashes of a roller coaster, specifically the chain pulling to the top of the hill. I'm dreading it. The chain keeps changing structure (rope, metal, rubber) and the track changes shape each time, but it's the same damn roller coaster and I never get to the top. In real life I'm terrified of heights and won't go on a coaster that turns me upside down. Just in case it's relevant. Insert these vignettes at random into the narrative for the full effect.
Back to the conference center. Something's wrong with both the conference and with me. I keep climbing, ramps not stairs, up to higher and higher levels in the hotel to find someone to talk to. I finally see a little alcove away from everything with standard modular chairs and a coffee table and sit down. The walls in this place are all shades of orange. In this area they're particularly dark with no windows.
Vanessa Redgrave sits down and asks me whats wrong. She's sitting across from me and actually seems interested. I tell her. (This is one of the parts that's faded by the way; I have no idea what I said.) I know that I'm expecting her to suggest something to read, probably by Trotsky. So I'm shocked when she stands up and tells me that it's impossible to feel the way that I do at the moment if I'm properly aware of my body.
She starts by rubbing her two middle fingers against her thumbs. I stand up and start to do the same thing. Then, keeping her eyes locked on mine (not easy considering our vast height difference), she tells me to rub my forehead, my earlobes, my scalp, my neck, "my piehole." Sometimes she does what she's telling me to do, but sometimes she doesn't. All of this is by showing. Then she says, "once you know this you'll be fine," and walks off.
I wander off to find my friend, the professor. Everyone is supposed to gather by the water (I think it's a lake not an ocean or river). I don't want to go, and every time I do the rubbing exercise I've been given the feeling that I don't want to go gets stronger.
I ask the professor not to go either, but he says that he has to go. He knows it's going to be bad, but he and his colleagues will probably be protected if they can just finish carving the fat and skin off the carcass in front of them. They keep covering themselves in the bits they've carved off and leave the room.
Everyone is walking down the ramps, but I'm trying to get through in the other direction. I see Ms Redgrave in the distance, she waves and tells me to find my own way, but she's ready to go where the crowd is taking her.
I keep walking up the ramps against the traffic. Marlene Dietrich in full cabaret evening dress stops me. The crowd is thinning. I tell her that my friend and his colleagues have left behind their "ambassadorial rings." She pats my arm and says ambassadorial rings are all beautiful and that's why she's left hers in her will. She doesn't say to whom she's left it.
Then I tell her that I don't want to go with everybody else, that I think something bad will happen like an explosion. What should I do, follow my friends or leave (for the first time I see that I'm near a well-lit exit door). She smiles, pats my arm, and says, very loudly, "Get out."
I start for the exit which is when I wake up.
Both the movie stars felt beneficent. They were going where they needed to go or were ready to go. I was very worried about the professor going with everyone protected only by a layer of fat and skin.
Anyone think they can help with this?
St. Joan saw saints: Margaret, Catherine, and the Virgin, if I remember correctly. These days we don't know saints anywhere near as well, but we read all about movie stars. Everywhere. I watch old movies a lot. Trust me, I'm not saying I was touched by the supernatural. However, I'm wondering if the same type of dream would have presented itself differently were I not going through a crisis in faith or had I lived in an earlier time.
Bits of the dream were very disturbing, and the farther I get from it the less I remember. So, amateur psychologists have at it.
I was at a large facility -- conference center, hotel, something -- and there's a large conference going on. It appears to be political, but it may be academic.
Side note. Every once in awhile I get these flashes of a roller coaster, specifically the chain pulling to the top of the hill. I'm dreading it. The chain keeps changing structure (rope, metal, rubber) and the track changes shape each time, but it's the same damn roller coaster and I never get to the top. In real life I'm terrified of heights and won't go on a coaster that turns me upside down. Just in case it's relevant. Insert these vignettes at random into the narrative for the full effect.
Back to the conference center. Something's wrong with both the conference and with me. I keep climbing, ramps not stairs, up to higher and higher levels in the hotel to find someone to talk to. I finally see a little alcove away from everything with standard modular chairs and a coffee table and sit down. The walls in this place are all shades of orange. In this area they're particularly dark with no windows.
Vanessa Redgrave sits down and asks me whats wrong. She's sitting across from me and actually seems interested. I tell her. (This is one of the parts that's faded by the way; I have no idea what I said.) I know that I'm expecting her to suggest something to read, probably by Trotsky. So I'm shocked when she stands up and tells me that it's impossible to feel the way that I do at the moment if I'm properly aware of my body.
She starts by rubbing her two middle fingers against her thumbs. I stand up and start to do the same thing. Then, keeping her eyes locked on mine (not easy considering our vast height difference), she tells me to rub my forehead, my earlobes, my scalp, my neck, "my piehole." Sometimes she does what she's telling me to do, but sometimes she doesn't. All of this is by showing. Then she says, "once you know this you'll be fine," and walks off.
I wander off to find my friend, the professor. Everyone is supposed to gather by the water (I think it's a lake not an ocean or river). I don't want to go, and every time I do the rubbing exercise I've been given the feeling that I don't want to go gets stronger.
I ask the professor not to go either, but he says that he has to go. He knows it's going to be bad, but he and his colleagues will probably be protected if they can just finish carving the fat and skin off the carcass in front of them. They keep covering themselves in the bits they've carved off and leave the room.
Everyone is walking down the ramps, but I'm trying to get through in the other direction. I see Ms Redgrave in the distance, she waves and tells me to find my own way, but she's ready to go where the crowd is taking her.
I keep walking up the ramps against the traffic. Marlene Dietrich in full cabaret evening dress stops me. The crowd is thinning. I tell her that my friend and his colleagues have left behind their "ambassadorial rings." She pats my arm and says ambassadorial rings are all beautiful and that's why she's left hers in her will. She doesn't say to whom she's left it.
Then I tell her that I don't want to go with everybody else, that I think something bad will happen like an explosion. What should I do, follow my friends or leave (for the first time I see that I'm near a well-lit exit door). She smiles, pats my arm, and says, very loudly, "Get out."
I start for the exit which is when I wake up.
Both the movie stars felt beneficent. They were going where they needed to go or were ready to go. I was very worried about the professor going with everyone protected only by a layer of fat and skin.
Anyone think they can help with this?
