stream of

[anonymousblack]

look, i don't lucid dream. i have lucid flashes, moments when i put it together: geez, you know? not only am i not currently living in my childhood bedroom, but i painted over the lime green shelves in 1989 and then entirely removed them from the wall ten years after that, plus i don't remember this tarot deck as having quite so many cards drawn by eight year olds, so wow, this can't really be happening, can it? or i'll think: well, i really ought to try listening to that album before i wake up, because then i won't get to hear it. and then i'll just go on about my dream, unaffected. if it really, really clicks: if i put the language of "i am dreaming" along with the physical understanding of that idea, which has happened maybe twenty times in the course of my life, i startle myself awake with the recognition.

usually, i just act lucid while still staying in the course of the dream. for instance, this morning:

i'm working with my fellow freedom fighters to get out of the dystopian cliche that constitutes about 40% of my dreams that aren't unimaginable fights with my sister. we come around a corner in a strangely familiar crumbling cityscape and there, in an otherwise burned out stripmall, is a well lit and maintained sanrio shop from the mid-eighties. my eyes fall on the pearly pink storefront and i scream to my comrades:

OH SHIT! FALL BACK FALL BACK FALL BACK

i grab a friend and we run for cover. obviously, the looks i receive are questioning. i press my fingers to my temples and mutter to myself.

"what," someone asks, "what?"

"i've been trying to reprogram a little," i sob. "work out some new symbols for some of my major reoccurring themes. because i can't deal with the standards any longer. but longing is just one of those things i'm going to dream about, so the symbols are going to be there and - dragging you guys into this... i'm so sorry."

"what?"

"any time my subconscious drags out the fucking hello kitty store as a symbol for the things i'll never have... shit is about to get weird."

*

and... yeah.
pretty much.

Comments

[crimson-vita.livejournal.com]

I remember those stores. I think. I'm pretty sure.

[anonymousblack.livejournal.com]

lol. there used to be one at woodfield mall, apparently. i think i might have seen it once, but never actually went in. all i know is that when i was eight, it seemed like a magical place where magical things happened and i couldn't afford a one of 'em.

but at least there was that neat spot in woodfield where you could walk behind the fountains. or did i hallucinate that?

[crimson-vita.livejournal.com]

I hear you- it seemed like the place where little girls would go to claim their birthright as precious feminine little living dolls, but my parents didn’t get that memo either and I too was denigrated to Raisin Girl status. For which I’ll be forever grateful- but eight year olds tend to have Cornflake Girl stars in their eyes.

I never went to Woodfield when I was younger, it was too far away- so I can provide no help with the fountain question. For the life of me I can't remember where the memory of a Sanrio store is coming from- I only remember seeing one and getting that holy grail of little girlhood feeling from it.

[anonymousblack.livejournal.com]

yeah, it was definitely further away for you. my grandmother worked until retirement at the woodfield sears, selling appliances, so i think that's why we'd go there (very rarely) for grandparent related things.

i feel like the first interior shot on this page is where the fountain underpass used to be:

http://mall-hall-of-fame.blogspot.com/search/label/Chicago%27s%20Woodfield%20Mall

man.... some of those pictures. especially the interiors with red carpeting and the huge white "catwalks."

holy grail of little girlhood! i'm actually remembering possibly having some kind of hello kitty playset at some point. it was a little house and you could take the walls down and put them into a box that converted into a handled thing. i seem to feel like i had the thing, but i can't imagine where it came from. or where it went. maybe grandma caught on? otherwise, my only other hello kitty thing was a filthy pencil topper i found outside at recess.

i was hardcore raisin, too. in a classroom of kids who categorically picked out the raisins and threw 'em in the trash. they're just jealous, right? :-)

[elsewhereangel.livejournal.com]

I'm sure it didn't/doesn't feel this way for you but this is incredibly charming.

[anonymousblack.livejournal.com]

oh, man. whatever the case it was better than another one of the sister fight dreams.

dreaming has been very intense the last few days. this one was definitely charming (and funny) in comparison.