My Obsession with Pop Culture, Dreams & The Vote

Fellow Citizens:

Happy Monday to all! Well, Halloween is over and we’re moving on to a really big day – November 4. I would love to see photos of your kids or grandchildren or any kid, for that matter, in costumes. We had our usual stampede of trick-or-treaters and they were all really cute and surprisingly well-mannered. Very few snotty noses and sticky hands. One boy of about 10 was carting around a black kitten dressed as a devil. He said that he found the cat abandoned in an alley covered in ants and decided to rescue him. The cat (named something like Desperado) didn’t seem to mind trick-or-treating and I really had to hold back on not bartering for the cat with a bowl full of “airheads” candy.

Here’s the latest entry from the weekend:

My Obsession with Pop Culture, Dreams & The Vote

A few weeks ago I happened to watch a new TV sitcom starring the guy who played Bob Sugar (actor Jay Mohr), Tom Cruise’s sports agent rival in ‘Jerry Maguire.’ When Tom Cruise is involved, I always root for the rival or enemy, no matter how despicable and even if it means the world will explode. Besides, Bob Sugar didn’t have the ridiculous line “You complete me” so he’s my hero.

Bob Sugar as ‘Gary, Unmarried’ is much beefier now and barely recognizable as Bob Sugar. He and the other actors on the show also have badly capped teeth. The teeth are distracting which may be a good thing. Plus the show needs a new wardrobe person. And a hair-stylist. Anyway, one line in the show caught my attention. Gary-Bob-Jay, a house painter, and his ex-wife, a clone of every other 30-something brunette actress on TV, disclose that a) he has a new, much younger and way hotter girlfriend (played by a former super model..oh, sure supermodels always date house painters – wait didn’t John Cougar Mellencamp snag one? Nevermind), and b) she is engaged to be married to none other than their former marriage counselor/therapist (Ed Begley Jr.) When Gary-Bob-Jay encounters Ed Begley Jr. he states something along the lines of “I don’t know what’s worse; you hooking up with my ex-wife or making me keep a dream journal.”

A dream journal. An Ed Begley Jr. type has never suggested that I keep one, but you guessed it, I actually keep a dream journal (surprise). I dream a lot. All the time. I’m a dreamer.

Of course, this led me to think about dreams. What do they mean? Do they serve a purpose? Do we really act on them? Why do I journal them?

I’ll first address day dreams, and in my case, a likely symptom of attention deficit disorder. My favorite day dream is where I’m a young Ava Gardner (without all the marriages, specifically to Mickey Rooney/Andy Hardy, although it’s weird because I’m married to an Andy and he is slightly taller than Mickey Rooney..I love you, honey, all 5’7’’of you.) In Ava mode, I travel the world and it’s so easy! No matter where I go, I’m always dressed in a white sundress and heels, wearing Ray Bans, and carrying a vintage suitcase (round, also white, no wheels). I exit the plane outdoors in beautiful, smog-free weather (no suffocating jet bridges). Unlike in real life, I never trip, stumble, break a nail while fumbling with my luggage (black, basic, Samsonite) or forget to place all 3 oz containers of liquids into FAA regulation quart size Ziploc bags for separate screening. I’m permanently on vacation and drive around exotic locations in a convertible. I’m never too cold or too hot, layers are not required, and I’m always splendidly happy. Fortunately and unlike in other women’s dreams, Fabio never shows up. The Italian Stud and his fake butter…what kind of a fantasy is that? Give me Colin Firth and extra virgin olive oil any day!

Next are the dreams that occur while sleeping…always vivid (and utterly strange) with an occasional nightmare. I know there are scientific theories about R.E.M. and overactive neurotransmitters, as well as the effect of external stimuli (too much TV) and mood (usually irritable). What about snoring as a stimulus? I wonder if snoring affects your dreams or just the dreams of the person in bed next to you. This may explain why Andy never dreams. Regarding that topic, I’m sorry, but I’m not giving up my uvula (look it up) in order to correct my snoring disorder/poorly constructed throat.

Moving on. I’m also aware of an entire industry devoted to dream interpretation because several years ago I became concerned about the recurrence of snakes and pickles in my dreams. In one recurring dream, I climb a glass staircase filled with pickles. I was relieved to learn from a dream interpretation source that snakes and pickles are not necessarily bad omens and most likely a representation of my struggle to overcome a world of male-dominance.

As a country, we obviously need more scientific research in this area. I fully expect a legislator (possibly one with a Wiccan constituency) to add this as pork to a health care bill or possibly carve out as an entitlement. It will cost a fortune but at least I, and others like me, will no longer fear or try to trample pickles.

We’ve all had dreams about going to work naked (or discovering you’re naked at work), forgetting your locker combination, being chased by ninjas, searching unsuccessfully for a clean, operational bathroom (when you really, really need to go), driving at night without headlights, traveling in airplanes that taxi forever and never take off (the wings just fold up) and reuniting with dead relatives, among other common themes.

I’ve had all those dreams, multiple times. My deceased grandfathers show up on occasion looking like Abe Lincoln (PaPa) and Jason Robards (Grannin). Once I attended the Grammy Awards (or it could have been the American Music Awards – the fashion on the red carpet was atrocious!) with my grandmother (looked just like MeMa, bless her, and not the Queen Mother – but close). She wore a red corsage and I wore a black pant suit (even in my dreams I’m fashion-challenged!) but with a red blouse unbuttoned and revealing a white undergarment (a very risqué cotton Playtex). Also, an occasional “celebrity” appears. Some of the better known celebrities in my dreams are Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson (don’t ask), Daryl Hannah, and Suzanne Pleshette (why?)

A strange thing occurred with the Pleshette dream. I hadn’t though of her (at least consciously) in decades and for some unknown reason she appeared in my dream from January 13, 2008. In the dream, I hitched a ride with Ms. Pleshette and her elderly father (possibly a ghost because I could poke my finger through him) in their luxury SUV after walking barefoot on blistering hot pavement after my car broke down and other sorted misadventures. As a Good Samaritan, Suzanne gave me a lift to Houston where I was to visit a cave. Her father, the ghost, talked nonstop about “back in the day” and the high plains.

One week later on January 20, I was fully awake and reading the Sunday newspaper. There it was – an obit “Suzanne Pleshette, Actress Who Played Bob Newhart’s TV Wife Dies.” I believe the Ancient Egyptians would have appreciated the spookiness of that dream (and many others) and possibly mummified me in a special pyramid. But at another time and place, I might have been burned at the stake. To preserve the evidence, I pasted a copy of the obit next to my journal entry in case a future anthropologist is desperate for material.

We all know how difficult it is to put work out of your mind. A couple of memorable dreams involved the office. In one, I went into labor on my desk while my co-workers stood around chain smoking and waiting for the baby’s head to crown, at least I hope it was a baby and not a four volume claim file, and in the other, I had to keep my combo desk/treadmill going at 6 mph (at an incline!) in order to feed correspondence into a special transmission slot to the home office to meet productivity objectives. At one point I collapsed from exhaustion and slipped off the back of the desk/treadmill. An unidentified co-worker wearing a skirt and matching head/sweatband jumped on as an assist. We were all giving each other high fives at the end of the day. Teamwork! I woke up feeling okay and a pound lighter!

I frequently dream about animals (other than snakes). Once I had two black cats as pets, Zoe and Biggs, both adopted strays. Zoe went missing one cold December morning and I was very worried about what happened to her. Andy’s theory was that a Great Horned Owl swept down from atop the flagpole on Flag Pole Hill on to the greenbelt and carried her away. I refused to believe it and dreamt that I was driving down a deserted service road and came across Zoe walking along carrying a bindle over her shoulder. I quickly opened the car door and she jumped in apparently having had enough of life as a hobo cat. Zoe was covered in red marks and had a very bad cough. Back at home, she and Biggs did not immediately recognize each other and a small cat fight broke out. Biggs, the top cat, then sat up on his hind legs (much like a baboon) and allowed Zoe to burrow her head into his chest. He began to lick her injured head. It was a touching reunion but unfortunately just a dream. The Great Horned Owl never returned Zoe. Please know that we did everything to locate that darn cat even though she was wild and horribly bad-mannered. Even when she scratched our faces (while simultaneously purring) we chose to believe that she was misunderstood (cat bi-polar) and needed love.

Occasionally in my dreams, I will rescue a neglected baby and then do a terrible job of feeding it all the wrong things. I also need to be rescued quite frequently. Once a priest helped me downstairs from my old apartment on Beltline Road (I still had a key and tried to hide there) and across a bloody riot scene (too gruesome to describe) to the safety of a high school football field where a marching band was playing “Everybody Dance Now!” Thankfully, the priest was not played by Tom Cruise. That would have been a legitimate nightmare.

Last, but not least, and because this entry comes on the eve of a historic election, a dream that comes to mind is the ‘American Dream’ (maybe I should insert ‘my friends’ for political non-effect.) Yes, I believe that it exists. History tells me so. When we get frustrated and worried about the state of the union (all with good reason) just remember that we have freedom and opportunity or at least freedom to create some kind of opportunity. We can’t be complacent, take things for granted and expect all to be great. Now’s the time to step up, reevaluate our priorities and contribute (I may have to give up my pop culture obsession for the greater good). Giving of ourselves will get us through.

Remember your vote (and dreams) count.

Have a great week!

CitizenB