First, I should mention that I’m not a great dancer. You know when clothes get clogged in your washing machine during the rinse cycle and the whole machine shakes so violently you think it’s going to break? That’s me during slow dances.
But back to dreams. They’re supposed to provide you with wish fulfillment. You’re making love to that one unobtainable person you lust after. You’re a superhero and you can fly. You’re at a Mariners World Series game (okay, that’s maybe too crazy). In any event, unconscious desires often get played out in the privacy and safety of dreams (your Democrat friends are not going to kill you because Marjorie Taylor Greene is your nightly dominatrix).
Anyway, last night I dreamed I was at some party in a ballroom and there was a large dance floor. Very SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER. (My dreams do have good art direction, I will say that.) No one was dancing, but in the dream I thought to myself, “Boy, wouldn’t it be great if I could go out there and bust some moves? Wouldn’t it be cool if I were suddenly Fred Astaire?” I sighed and that was that.
When I woke up I thought, “Hey, I shouldn’t be WISHING to dance in the dream. I should be actually DOING it.” If I can't dance in my own fucking dream then when can I?
How pathetic am I that my fantasy is to wish for something? And that’s when I realized I was in need of professional help.
Now this could just be a by-product of being a writer. I’m used to playing out cool scenarios, but only on the page. Highly paid actors get to do the steamy love scenes I construct – not me. Actors get the big laughs. Actors light up the dance floor. I get network notes.
I hope to eventually work through these nocturnal issues. I long for the days I can actively play out my fantasies. I’ll let you know if that’s what I wish for in my dreams tonight.
18 comments :
"If you keep on believing
The dream that you wish will come true"
Ken, you've currently got better odds of winning "Dancing With The Stars" than writing a script for HBO Max.
Whenever I'm under a particularly heavy work load, like trying to write two TV shows plus the daily web content while finishing my taxes, I have what I call "drudgery dreams." I have to do some impossible, repetitive task that never ends, like knocking over and sprinkling ant killer on an endless number of fire ant mounds on a field that stretches into the distance. I can't even get my brain to give me a break when I'm asleep.
Who told you that dreams are supposed to be wish fulfillment? With the exception of sex dreams, the ones that aren't terrifying are, at least, frustrating. Those are the good ones. When you start dreaming blissful fantasies on a regular basis, that's when you'll need therapy.
Dreams aren't made to provide wish fullfilment. They exist to help the brain process trash (traumas, bad experience, anxieties, etc.), simply put. (Actually we don't *really* know what dreams are there for, but this certainly seems to be one major function.)
You cannot dream of something without prior first-hand experience. When e.g. your dreams prevent you from "busting a move" on the dancefloor, then that's because this is truly beyond your ability and you have never done it. (Some might object and say "but I can't fly either yet I dream I'm flying" - yeah, true. But you can swim, right? Ever been diving underwater? When you dream you're flying, you're actually reliving the experience of swimming, except in air instead of water.)
If you can remember your dreams (routinely, often), then this means you may have a sleep disorder, or you sleep badly for other reasons (Noisy environment? Unsuitable bed?)
And dreaming of how you put words in people's mouhts like in the Alan/David example frankly is perfectly alright. This is what you do, what's important to you, a major element and activity in your life. No surprise at all to dream something like that, and not unnormal whatsoever.
Wait, Ken's not a great dancer. I never saw that one coming.
Have you ever had a "lucid dream," where you realize you're dreaming while you're dreaming? Those are the freakiest things in the world. I've had that happen a few times. But some people actually practice it, so that they can attempt to control their dreams while they're asleep (but awake within the dream). Maybe you should try it.
We just watched a movie about that with Martin Freeman called, "The Good Night"
>(your Democrat friends are not going to kill >you because Marjorie Taylor Greene is your >nightly dominatrix).
To each their own, Ken, but geez, I am NEVER going to unsee that...
My own dreams rarely if ever veer into fantasies fulfilled or into nightmares. In fact, my subconscious imagination seems disinclined to get very inventive at all. A long-past almost-girlfriend appears, but we're never in a situation to talk. Or I'm at something like Disneyland and never quite make it to a ride.
The most frequent reality-based dreams (very loosely based) continue to be work-related. Now retired, I was laid off a marketing job after multiple decades; got by on freelance but never had an on-site position again. Keep having dreams where I'm sort of back there, calmly viewing it ending for various reasons. Last night I was there, dealing with pre-computer technology I'd never seen before and knowing I couldn't make it work. Less a nightmare than an "oh, ****." Never the school exam nightmare, but my amateur theater days yielded a few dreams of performances collapsing into dull confusion.
Now and again something I remembered as a childhood dream turns out to be something I actually saw: A lousy animated feature called "Johnny the Giant Killer"; the nightclub scene from "Mighty Joe Young"; the Cliff House in San Francisco circa 1960.
And then there's the one about eating a giant marshmallow ...
After 50 years in the broadcasting biz, most of it on the air, I periodically have the same dream EVERYONE who has ever been on the air has. And I'll bet you have too, Ken.
I'm in a strange radio studio. I don't know how any of the equipment works. I don't know anything about the format, the station's call letters or name. There is no one to ask. And the timer playing whatever song is playing is quickly counting down to zero...and dead air.
I haven't set foot in a radio studio since before COVID, and I still have this nightmare every couple of months.
I swear this is true--I once dreamed that Joey Bishop warmed up the congregation before Sunday morning Mass at a local Roman Catholic Church
Bishop, wearing a tux, had his own drummer and told the following joke from the altar:
"This guy I know went to the VD clinic. The doctor told him to drop his pants. The guy said, "I did, that why I'm here"!
Last week I had a dream that I parked car, went into a building, say down in the waiting room and waited. Mostly sitting there waiting.
How's that for an unfulfilling fantasy?
Re another type of dream seeking fulfillment, the Guardian today has a piece arguing that auditions should be made less awful for actors (https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2022/aug/21/actors-endure-litany-misery-auditions-former-rsc-director-adrian-noble). Most of the article has fairly obvious advice: pay attention, give the actor the courtesy of your time, etc. One bit is startling: actors are being increasingly asked to sign NDAs before they are allowed to audition. So, an FQ: is this happening in the US, too, or is it a bit of UK weirdness?
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I never heard of it. I'll look it up.
Speaking of Fred Astaire...one of the best sketches from the Carol Burnett Show (season 9), Ken Berry is amazing:
https://youtu.be/a3LlZ4SYDaA
I used to work at Taco Bell. A man came up and asked for a small order of fries. I told him we don't serve fries at Taco Bell. He said, "OK" and left.
And then I woke up.
This mundane dream was a clear sign that I had to stop working for Taco Bell.
I had a dream recently in which I was at The Price is Right taping and Drew Carey kept giving me prizes I didn't even have to guess. Most fulfilling dream I've ever had.
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