Lights Out...REM...Action!!!

I am lucky, because I have really weird, vivid dreams all the time. Occasionally, they are so visceral and acutely sensory that I wake up exhausted. They often become really good story outlines that I note down and save for future writings.

Last night I had a dream that on my lunch break I went shopping for a strapless bra and ran into an old friend Pam. We ended driving to New York, looking for horses, and going to a restaurant for lunch where they were holding an auction. Henry Rollins was a panelist at the auction and he had three kittens with him. One of the kittens was the size of a Matchbox car and was covered in pink rhinestones. The entire dream, I was worried about getting back to work so I didn't get fired.

One of the peculiar things about my dreams are the settings which seem to be more like movie sets. For example, there is a department store where I often go to shop in my dreams. The set up and feel of the store is exactly the same every dream, where the stairs are, the set up of the racks, the doorways, but the merchandise, employees and purpose change with each dream. I'm never shopping for the same thing or for the same purpose yet it always feels haunting and familiar.

Other locations include a downtown, the interior of the a home, a shopping mall, and a few other specific locations that seem like they are movie sets stored in some warehouse in my brain and are rolled out and dressed specifically for different dreams.

The weirdest part is that these dream places aren't replicas of places I've ever been to in my waking life. There's a sense of intimacy that throws me off every time I got to one of these places while I sleep. I recognize it, but it's totally new, every time.