Nightmares and Pleasant Dreams

A couple of weeks ago, I had a nightmare.  We were camping in some snow covered location near a frozen lake.  Why we were there, I don’t know.  (Dream logic: It made perfect sense that we’d be there while I was dreaming.)  In any event, it began to warm and the lake melted.

As JSL went to play in the shores by the now-thawed water, I started to warn him to stay away.  Suddenly, the lake turned into a swimming pool with JSL on the steps leading in.  JSL toppled backwards and somehow landed into the deep end.  B, standing on the side of the pool, screamed as JSL sank to the bottom, unable to swim.  I dove in but suddenly found myself unable to dive.  All I could do was watch my son sinking to the depths.

And then I woke up.

The dream was so realistic that, even though I knew it was a dream, I had to get out of bed and check on the boys just to be sure.  JSL was sound asleep in his bed without a drop of water on him.  I was so glad that it was all a dream.

Another night, I wasn’t as happy.  That was the night that I found out that we won a ton of money.  As in over $200,000.  I collected my winnings – in cash for some reason – and returned to our house to find a big party celebrating our good fortune.  Conscious that we had a lot of cash lying around a lot of people, we hid it in the boys’ room.  Just as B and I helped ourselves to some party food and began to plan how to spend our money, I remarked to her how glad I was that this wasn’t a dream.

And then I woke up.

I don’t think I’ve ever been so desperate to go back to sleep.  I tried hard to convince myself that it was real.  The winnings were right there if only I could doze off again.  The dream was real and it was waking that was the lie.  I really had won over two hundred thousand dollars.  Sadly, it wasn’t the case.  As I gave up and got out of bed, my winnings dissolved completely in my mind.

I’d wish that you could make your dreams a reality, but that would probably extend to nightmares as well.  Given that, I’m glad that our dreams aren’t real.  Even if our best dreams fade away entirely in the morning light, it is much better than having our worst nightmares come true for even a split second in the real world.