back burner of brain

[freckles_and_doubt]

I had a truly, truly weird dream the other night, one of those vividly compelling ones that is still haunting me with that feeling that I have to plumb its little metaphors or my head might explode. Place is a small stone house halfway up a mountain. Occupants of same are self and three men (unknown, i.e. no actual people I know) who are, like me, wizards. Situation is a nasty fantasy-style war, much consulting of maps to see how the enemy is encroaching on all fronts. Also much angst and trauma about the fact that the enemy is somehow affecting magic, it's not working properly.

The focus, nub and central image of this dream is the fact that there is only one four-legged wooden stool left for me to sit on, and it's broken. One of its legs is missing the bottom 4 cm or so. Technically, I should be able to mend this with a pass of my hand, which I do: I run my hand over the leg, and suddenly it's whole again. Except that one of the other wizards looks over at me and laughs, warning me that it always works like that, and it'll fall apart again at 1pm the next day. (Very definite time). I look at it closely, and realise that the whole leg is an illusion, the bottom piece is only loosely tacked on. This is obviously a result of the fact that magic is not working properly, and I spend the rest of the dream sitting uneasily on the mended stool, waiting for it to break. Fortunately my alarm goes before it does.

I cannot work out if I'm being horribly threatened by (a) encroaching outside pressures sapping my will, (b) my own inadequacy, (c) men, (d) my department, or (e) any combination of the above. But, damn, that broken stool is vivid. Am happy to accept recommendations for a competent exorcist. Or possibly shrink.

This week has been a mad social whirl, and continues same. Tuesday evening started with movies - Vanity Fair with Jo-the-younger, lovely period drama and, as far as I can tell from only being halfway through the book again, remarkably true to the original, despite inevitable compression and Mira Nair-esque focus on India. The film was distinguished by the presence of Jonathan Rhys Davies, who does incredibly cool total bastards (notably Steerpike in Gormenghast) and Tom Sturridge, the same dark, good-looking boy actor who did Julia's son in Being Julia, and is obviously flavour du jour in Brit film circles. He's cute; I'm wondering why the Harry Potter franchise hasn't snapped him up, although it's probably because he is true to the muse and only does Serious Drama. Anyway. Following film, we headed into Obs and joined Phlp for supper at Diva's, which was cool. Then gig at Armchair Theatre, first time I've seen Wicked City in yonks, was duly impressed, as much by Phlp's vocal acrobatics as anything else. Damn, Ivan is scarey on stage. Yesterday afternoon, impromptu tea with Jo&Stv, who had fled Jane&Ween's mad tornado charlady; much nonsense talked, in pleasant fashion. Last night was supper with Neil&Karen&Emma, ostensibly to watch Shrek II in pursuance of my academic goals, but in fact we simply ate excellent food and gassed a lot. Which is, in microcosm, the story of my current academic life. Sigh. Emma is turning into a pixie; she spent a good portion of the evening staring at me and doing an excellent imitation of a shocked goblin. Very cute, like something out of Labyrinth. She actually has pointy ears. Tonight I feed my hordes of players and DM for them, insert megalomanic cackle here. Saturday is SCA cooking, Sunday is rapier and a dinner party, good lord I am a hotbed of social wossname.

I have located my cellphone (left in Lara's car) but still haven't got around to collecting it, thereby demonstrating the extent to which it is deeply uncentral to my mode of life. Tech, so optional, she says, feverishly connecting to the Internet.

Comments

dreams

[(Anonymous)]

My first reaction to the dream was that, in the end, it was a positive one. In the beginning, you were only seeing the broken bottom half of the stool; in the end, you understood where it was really broken. So it seemed to me a dream of seeing deeper, of being able to ascertain the real problem in something rather than the surface issue.

So it may be that you need to look closer at something in your life and examine whether there are deeper issues than the surface ones you already see. Even if the result is painful or shocking, the final result will be positive, because you'll be able to address the real problem rather than ineffectually putting a Band-Aid on the wound.

Personally, I think it means you should ditch your PC and get a Mac...

Love, Rhieinwen

Re: dreams

[extemporanea.livejournal.com]

Rhieinwen! how cool to see you popping up, hope it means your hectic life has calmed down a little.

Interesting interpretation; I was more worried about the fact that I thought I had the situation under control until another (older male) person pointed out my inadequacy, from his position of superior knowledge. Which is, in fact exactly my experience of my attempts to find a permanent post in the department. So, yes, definite sense of revelation, but not really by me.

I don't think it means I need a Mac. I think it means I need to run Linux instead of Windows ;>.

being literal

[strawberryfrog.livejournal.com]

Hm, perhaps this is being a bit literal, but then again it took me a while to see it. You do work in a building that is on the slope of a mountain, with several other people who have the same esoteric learnings, and it is continually besieged by barbarian undergraduate hordes, right?

Wicked City is Ivan and Philip A in a band? It could be good, in bad way, or it could just be bad.

Re: being literal

[(Anonymous)]

... and a lot of the furniture is broken.

wolverine_nun

Re: being literal

[strawberryfrog.livejournal.com]

A job as a facualty member is sometimes called a "seat", right? What's odd is that stools only need four legs to be stable, a fourth leg is a fifth wheel.

And lectures being in the morning, it is a place where the magic of student interest tends to evaporate around lunchtime.

Re: being literal

[extemporanea.livejournal.com]

Good lord, you're right, I hadn't caught the slope-of-the-mountain bit. (Or, to be honest, the deep significance of broken furniture, w_n!)I was definitely tending to see the dream as talking about academic life, though, I'm very aware of that sense of fighting a losing battle against the overwhelming odds of (a) increasing student illiteracy, and (b) increasing student indifference. The magic, indeed, is under threat. And, as I said above, my personal experience is very much of being made to feel that my academic achievements are inadequate, by a cabal of older men.

The seat bit is interesting, but it really didn't feel like that kind of seat. Your basic wooden bar-stool, really. I think its significance is that there isn't a proper one for me, the one they have left over is broken. I don't have a proper post, I have a temporary one (of course, yes, it expires after two years!) worth a lot less. I therefore don't sit easily.

A particularly neat symbolic outline of the problem, actually. Of course, if I'm looking to my subconscious to provide actual solutions, it's a different story. Dream left me stranded with the hordes incoming. There is no escape!

Re: being literal

[extemporanea.livejournal.com]

Wicked City is Ivan and Philip A in a band? It could be good, in bad way, or it could just be bad.

Forgot to reply to this. Definitely good in a bad way. They have a pleasingly evil sense of in-your-face iconoclasm, lyrics and performance wise, and the music is interesting and at times complex. Some problems of balance and occasional repetitiveness, but no amateur band is really without those, and I think they're eminently fixable. And so cool to see women on stage in the rock context (bassist and second guitar are female).