Dreamscape: Was this old Manchester?

Back to the yesterdays of yesteryear

The wonder of dreamland and what one can discover in almost hallucinatory repose is an interesting spectacle. The other night, I walked by the University of Manchester and landed in a picturesque landscape more than 40 years ago, buildings I recognised and things that had changed.

A distinct Manchester Business School sponsored by a large conglomerate, its hoarding atop the school, so unmistakable, yet I forget. Buildings that have been replaced, old in Victorian red brick or new with the facade of brutalist architecture in stark concrete, I was somewhere I knew and did not know.

A picturesque idyll, I recall

Oxford Road was a narrow and busy tree-lined avenue, looking like a forlorn escape from the city to a remote location that you might only visit on business or purpose alone. A village road with cottages from a bygone time, now lost to the sepia of a picture found in the attic of a long-gone ancestor’s home.

I walked up the nondescript pavement that looked more like a grassy verge, dusty rather than macadamised, dust swept up by the heat of summer, all the way to St Peter's Square that had the semblance of a motor park terminus bustling with the energy of an African city station.

In the wonder of dreams

It was full of confusion, I could not find the bus I needed to board, if I could determine where I was even going. I wandered around listless and thinking about why I consciously felt I had travelled back in time from a more familiar present.

Indeed, Manchester was different back then, before I ever came to live in Manchester, but between my dream and the reality, I cannot vouch for truth in my dreams. I guess it just brought many memories to play and create a dreamscape of a time it was best I never experienced. The power of imagination in dreams sends you to times and places you never knew existed.

Thought Picnic: Deep down where love lives

The ins of deep

In my dream playing things of a time when what is desired is constantly renewed with feeling and engagement that warms you from the inside. The proximity and closeness that changes lives in assuredly noticeable ways even if the means of such transformation is not all clear to observers.

In my mind is the beauty of a city, a place that harbours memories so cherished by the sea and the things we do with the people we meet. I walk through on bridges, crossing roads to towpaths by marinas festooned with grand boats moored idling for ages. Yet, it is about being with rather than being at.

In my heart, I am in thrall of one who has touched me and brought joy into my being. Daily we see each other, more from afar than near and I wonder just what life we could make it. In the eyes, in the smiles, in the sound of laughter in reaction to many things said, each like a symphony played on instruments of unique personality, we relate so completely.

The big dreams without limits

I dream many dreams,
None at all little or small,
For with the gift of faith,
I move impossible mountains,
With the joy of hope,
I see the unseen possible,
The power of love,
Changing my life along with others.

I dream many dreams,
My imagination I great thrall,
Of beauty in which I bathe,
I gleam in sparking fountains,
Nothing limiting my scope,
My world inexhaustible,
By the glow of love,
I appreciate the goodness in others.

I dream many dreams,
To the sound of a waterfall,
Nature lays out a swathe,
Rolling into verdant mountains,
Into the fresh air, I elope,
To embrace the adorable,
In the depth of love,
I find one perfect out of all others.

 

Dreamscape: To Japan on a bicycle

Seeing my guests off

We had a wonderful evening together, friends and strangers about to be friends, and then it was time to go home. They had come a long way and we set off to the station.

There were two bicycles, that is what they apparently rode on to visit as we made for the station. It was late, we had to be quick. On getting to the station, I was in charge of one of the bicycles and we had difficulty going through the gates or finding the right platform.

In the process, we lost sight of each other and I was left with one of the strangers, in the confusion, as we ran up and down the escalators, one of us walked the way down an escalator as it was rolling up, I could not do that with a bicycle. We finally found our platform, two trains leaving at the same time, for Japan.

A toilet wonder to behold

I got on the train and found a seat as the stranger did beside me, only to be disturbed by a hawker who through the whole journey was selling snake-oil remedies using the context of Japanese fables of old, nothing that I heard was worth parting with my hard-earned cash for.

Meanwhile, the technology on the train could not be ignored, I could push a button, very much like the stopping bell of a bus, to initiate a bowel evacuation by wireless means, fascinating it was, that no one could tell who was filling the toilet with waste, it could really have been anyone else.

Time and station stops late into the night, we got to last stop and alighted. Then it seemed our none of our other company made any of the trains, they were stuck somewhere incomprehensible as we spoke on the phone.

A cab to nowhere sensible

I thought I could ride the bicycle back home when I realised I had left it on the train, the train that already left the station taking the staff with it. The other trains were pulling out that I just could not summon the courage to tell my friend that I had lost her bicycle.

The matter of getting home from Japan became a pressing issue, I had to get a taxi, the first shop had unhelpful people who pretended to offered a service of indifference and mockery, they did not care. When I found the cab office, the faces all looked familiar but I was not sure, the drivers unperturbed in every state of lackadaisical abandon until the controller was pointed out to me.

He asked where I was going, my home was a place I had not been in 27 years, the cost I could not meet because I did not have enough money and as I was thinking of booking a hotel room for the night, I did not have to do any of that, I was saved the ordeal.

REM - Rapid Eye Madness

For between Edinburgh where I am, the London Underground where we boarded trains for Japan, probably a suburb called Japan-town very much like Chinatown, a cab office that seemed to have Nigerian drivers to wanting a ride to Isolo in Lagos, Nigeria, I was caught in the landscape of vivid dreams, where distances are shortened and problems can be quite insurmountable.

I had jolted out of my sleep as the background activity coming from my computer playing Channel 4 on BBC was broadcasting the Japan season ended. Phew!

I dream a little dream of me

I have great capacity to dream,
Engage in the power of life-giving hope,
With all that burning desire,
I must curb my enthusiasm.

Where I’ve had no light to my beam,
Giving me every reason to mope,
I find no urge to retire,
It is not a function of my phantasm.

It is all part of the scheme,
The ways we are deeply taught to cope,
That fuels the things to which we aspire,
We are born to bridge the chasm.

That we never run out of steam,
Or rarely in the dark only to grope,
For we live to learn and acquire,
A lasting happiness full of enthusiasm.

Thought Picnic: The anger of dreams in precis

Dream a biggie

Dreams are an interesting window on the subconscious, having the ability to reveal strengths and expose weaknesses.

There are things that can never be done in real life that a person may acquire a Matrix-like simulated reality ability to do with ease, in dreams. Speak languages, do feats of superhuman strength, acquire knowledge, solve problems, all limited by the capacity of the mind for imagination.

Dream a little

However, where weaknesses are exposed, the signs are debilitating, like lights not coming on when the switch is flicked, a slurring of the speech when one is fighting a case or the absence of coordinated strength when flipping out in annoyance or anger.

This apparent weakness usually witnessed by other dramatis personae in the dream is quite humiliating, as actions cannot seem to follow the good intentions. In the mind of the dreamer a sense of futility looms, characteristic of failed ambition and with that, fear might take hold.

It is at this point that the only sensible thing to do is to snap out of that dream, possibly by waking up and reflecting on how there might be another time to be equipped to do better.

Impian Stories: Dreams yet unfulfilled

A determination

One day, as we all tend to say, I am going to live my own life, seek my own fortune, chase after my own dreams and latch onto the happiness that has long eluded me.

For there are dark recesses, shadows, secrets and fears, the feeling that some are being protected from truths that are mine, but unknown to many.

Who I am is a prism viewed from different perspectives of incidence of light, the many colours, some vibrant, some dull, some bright, some dark – the sum of my parts that has become the product that you see, is only revealed in part, in parts, the whole is never known.

Being myself to myself

Even to myself, I have concealed a treasure trove of detail I have tried not to revisit in the attic of my memory, gathering dust, covering skeletons, desperately attempting to extricate myself from a bad history to walk into a good future, dogged and chased by blood-thirsty demons in relentless pursuit of my soul.

As the autumn comes, in life one might well have a spring cleaning, open the windows, let the air in, dust the carpets, remove the veil and light up the night and bask in a new freedom, we all need to cut away somewhere, somehow, sometime and face up to the truth of who we really are.

One day, as we all tend to say, I am going to live my own life.

Please! No repeats or sequels for this dream

Seeding my dreams

I was warned one of the side effects would be vivid dreams, so I tried to fill my head with unsolved problems hoping to unravel the conundrums by utilising the excessive brain-power seeking thoughts to manipulate in sleep.

My thinking was like idle computers could be employed in parallel processing of complex algorithms, maybe dreams could be seeded with ideas and situation we do not seem to consciously resolve fast enough or well enough.

Too vivid for my memory

However, the dream I had on the Wednesday night onto Thursday morning is one I would not want a repeat of, neither would I want a sequel of it.

The vividness of the dream however stays with me from at type of remote addressing for systems where the links to the parts I wanted to address had decayed to becoming the gatekeeper of the portal to the afterlife.

The way that portal operated was what was intriguing, I was not afraid of the dead or the zombies that seemed to want to control me, I felt ready to deal with that and I ended up mastering that situation where normally people fell into a stupor of subservience.

Water and mercury

The portal however was like a concrete slab on which you stood and it flipped open in 2 ways to reveal a pool of water or a pool of mercury. When I finally got to discard the zombie, the portal flipped for the watery section indicating a good afterlife for that subject.

Apparently, the mercury pool represented the absence of life or ability, I caught a glimpse of the glistening pool as the portal flipped and even though I felt I might fall in either pool, there was a sense of balance that overtook me ensuring the portal slammed shut without taking in unready visitors.

I woke soon afterwards wondering what that was all about and this is just 6 days into my new pills to compound the long stretches of sleeplessness with sleeping pills? I think not, vivid dreams are had enough, but if you cannot wake up quick from them, that could be your final undoing.

If only we really could survive without any sleep, sometimes.

Dream a little dream for me

The life of dreams

It is not so much about being a control freak but there is need for some sort of control when I sleep. I dream very vivid dreams and usually remember the setting and context of those dreams.

Times are after waking up I try to see if there is anything to learn from those dreams and make appropriate adjustments to accommodate those lessons.

Another peculiarity is I cannot sleep without some accompanying sound, some classical music, the gospels read in the background, my television on at a news channel – I need the boundaries of external sound to keep my dreams from running away from me.

Sounds of light

In fact, if the night is still and quiet, I cannot sleep, my mind becomes a radio telescope searching out for the presence of life and sound in some nether or outward place, by which time one is primed to be startled, scared and beginning to lose ones sanity.

The vagaries of modern life has turned us into freaks which for me includes the need to have some white light on when sleeping – why I wake within 5 minutes of lights going out when asleep just amazes me, maybe it is something to do with the amounts of light shone in the eyes of pre-term babies at birth.

Snapping for justice

Anyway, I dreamt last night, I walked out onto balcony that had a number of dream-recognised relations when looking into the courtyard there was this familiar old lady waving around a pole as if to fend off unruly kids.

Then four hoodlums approached her to rough her up, I shouted from the balcony to dissuade them but they did not relent, there was nothing I could do from that setting as I asked for a camera for at least record the event for a consequent police investigation.

I did get a camera and took quite a few good photographs, at one time, it appeared all the four hoodlums were posing for me and I got very good shots of their faces.

When they realised they were being photographed, they ran off, however, I cannot say what became of the lady afterwards, it is not clear if anyone ran to her aid or helped her afterwards.

Unhelpful help

What annoyed me on review was that everyone was in praise of my presence of mind to ask for a camera to take pictures and as I went back into the building, someone offered to get the pictures off the camera for analysis and so on, I neither saw picture nor camera after that.

Strangely, in one of the many twists and turns that my dreams have, the camera happened to belong to the lady, she had left it when she went for her walk and in some way the name she had was quite familiar.

On reviewing the dream I realised I should have fully supervised the handling of the pictures, ensured if I could that I backed up the material and got the evidence to the police as soon as possible.

Between ideas and effective action

Much as I could record the horrible event for the purposes of bringing justice to those hoodlums, I was surprised that I had not seen to having someone tend to the lady, we were all enamoured by the singular act of someone taking pictures when a lady had been roughed up.

What I take away from this is how to handle critical information on which justice and fairness might rely, I should not give it up easily if it is not going to the relevant authorities no matter how familiar I am with the person who requests it and I should be careful about unsolicited help which might end up depriving me of important work.

I should also have the presence of mind to address the humanity and humanitarian issues I find myself in and see the matters through to satisfactory conclusions so that I do not find myself aching about why I did my dreams did not end perfectly.