Your Fucking Head Split

I know some of the no one who reads this blog will disagree with me, but: I don't dream. Pretty much don't dream. I dreamed a lot as a child, but I haven't had a memorable dream outside of fever-caused ones since I was 17 or so.

I don't know what caused it: I smoked a little pot around then, but that's not really a likely culprit. I started drinking around then, so maybe that was it. I also found out my ex was pregnant—my daughter was born 3 days after my 18th birthday—I suppose it could have been stress. It freaked me right out and I nearly had a nervous breakdown trying to figure out how to tell my parents.

I went through a very long period of drifting, including university. I have done a lot of jobs with no real direction other than looking for a paycheque/ability to pay child support and that something sounded interesting. That's changed now, in that I have goals. I don't have a dream, at least—nothing so lofty. I have goals now. I have a job I want and love, a path ahead of me, and an honest desire to stick with it. I love what I'm doing right now. I'm very happy, and my now-13-year-old daughter is happy for me in what I'm doing. She's the sweetest kiddo in the whole world.

She has had bad dreams before, of course, like every child. Hers were either sweet ("I had to eat too many cupcakes!") or understandable. Typical insecurity for her age.

This is about my old dream though. From when I was 5 until I was about 9, I had a recurring dream at least once a week. In it, I was Superman. Not the exact character, but I would perform a few heroic acts with similar powers—with one difference.

You know that iconic image of Superman landing, one-foot-first in front of a calamity, and laughing off the attacks of the bad guys before wrapping them up for the cops? I could do that. I could fly. I could land, but it was only one-footed. And because of dream-logic, if I landed on one foot, I'd sort of spin around on it until the force of my flight was dissipated.

And then came the dragon.

Of course there was a dragon! It was the last thing I'd fight, every night. I'd try to show up early enough that I could do my weird spin-y landing before fighting it, and every night it would come out while I was still helpless and incinerate the princess I was trying to save. To this day, I regret never saving her; I tried so many times.

I have no idea what it was supposed to represent, but that image has stuck with me for a long time: Spinning my wheels while not going anywhere accomplishes nothing. At least, that's what I took away from it. I'd love to hear other interpretations though.