I had dreams about social awkwardness last night. In one, a retiring professor of my acquaintance announced that he was hosting a gigantic movie viewing, complete with drinks. While everyone around me enjoyed him or herself, I felt awkward because I didn't know how to approach my acquaintance and I didn't know whether to pay for the drinks. I was subsequently criticized for painting my fingernails in public (and having taken the polish from a basket that, once again, I was unsure was free).
In another I was at a dinner with a man whom I now realize as a relative with whom I have an awkward relationship. In the dream, though, he had just met me and asked me questions about my heritage and my accent. I immediately felt embarrassed about the accent because I suspected it seemed false to him.
I think I also dreamed about being awkward at work– looking up to find a very thin, very tanned mother standing above me being taken aback and confused by the way in which I am playing with her child. (This is a situation that really does happen all the time. Sometimes I am more absurdly imaginative than the children themselves, but I am frequently more absurdly imaginative than the parents. If we happen to be playing imaginatively – not that we always or even often are – parents may be taken aback.)
It seems like I rarely have good or even ambivalent dreams these days. Instead they all involve some sort of minor discomfort. Does this have to do with guilt over my work? (My real work?) Probably. It may also have something to do with the English Civil War reading I'm doing. All those Puritans have to have a detrimental effect on a person.
In another I was at a dinner with a man whom I now realize as a relative with whom I have an awkward relationship. In the dream, though, he had just met me and asked me questions about my heritage and my accent. I immediately felt embarrassed about the accent because I suspected it seemed false to him.
I think I also dreamed about being awkward at work– looking up to find a very thin, very tanned mother standing above me being taken aback and confused by the way in which I am playing with her child. (This is a situation that really does happen all the time. Sometimes I am more absurdly imaginative than the children themselves, but I am frequently more absurdly imaginative than the parents. If we happen to be playing imaginatively – not that we always or even often are – parents may be taken aback.)
It seems like I rarely have good or even ambivalent dreams these days. Instead they all involve some sort of minor discomfort. Does this have to do with guilt over my work? (My real work?) Probably. It may also have something to do with the English Civil War reading I'm doing. All those Puritans have to have a detrimental effect on a person.
Labels: dreams
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