Compost

The Dreamer is inside of his bedroom, in his bed, at night.

There is something boiling underneath his bed. He looks under the bed and fits that there is a stainless steel pot boiling over. He unplugs the pot, moves it out from under his bed, and begins to remove the contents. He picks up a “Y” shaped piece of organic material, it is still alive. He drops it back in the pot and it splashes the hot liquid and a drop hits him in the third eye.

Then the Dreamer is at a long table with his employees. There is food on the table. They are clearing the table. His employee Abi hands him her plate and says, “Compost”. His other employee Raj has a plate full of pastries: a croissant covered in jam. Raj turns to the Dreamer and says, “Yes, I know it’s a lot.”

Then the Dreamer is interviewing a candidate for a job. The Dreamer sees the candidate is an older white male, 50-60, wearing a backwards baseball cap. The candidate is sitting outside of a bank, in a chair, on the sidewalk. The Dreamer is writing down the answers to the interview questions, such as “Experience downloading templates and filling in forms.”

Then the Dreamer is inside his car in the city. Then the Dreamer is managing to drive both of his cars at the same time, one of them remotely. There are police behind him. Then the Dreamer turns the cars onto a gas station parking lot. The Dreamer says that he is in “Frederick, MD”. There are young black men with pants hanging off their butts walking throughout the parking lot.

Then the Dreamer is inside a fast food restaurant, ordering some food. There is a little boy behind the Dreamer, about seven years old. The boy keeps nudging the Dreamer in line. The Dreamer gets annoyed and tells the boy that “It is rude to touch other people in public.” The faces of the boy’s family look shocked, but nod their heads in agreement. Then the Dreamer gives the boy a fist bump. The boy says, “But I thought we weren’t supposed to touch in public.” The Dreamer says, “This is different because we’re both giving permission.”

Then the Dreamer is back with his employees, seated at a long table. There are employees that he knows, and employees that he does not know. The Dreamer is wondering where his employee Chris is. Then the Dreamer sees unknown employees on some computers in the back of the room: they have a Confederate Flag hoisted. Upon closer examination, the flag has the shadow of someone pissing on it. The Dreamer says to the employees, “This might be offensive to people from the South.”

Then the Dreamer is on an industrial tour with some employees. They go to a garbage dumpster. Inside the dumpster is a bunch of organic material, peels and vegetables. There is a thin transparent film over everything. One of the employees tells the Dreamer to put his hands on it. The Dreamer puts his hands on it and is told that it is “plastic”.

Then the Dreamer is outside and there is snow on the ground. His former employee, Daryl, is there skiing with his shirt off. There is some conversation about how well so-and-so did on the slopes even though it was their first time. The Dreamer skis away, swiftly, as if he was a good skier.

Then the Dreamer is back inside with the employees. Then the Dreamer is going through a box that has checks inside and a bunch of other papers. Then the Dreamer is talking with Chris about the whereabouts of the “Facilitator”. Chris says that the Facilitator that they had last year couldn’t make it this year. The Dreamer tells Chris to find another Facilitator.

Then the Dreamer is outside at night on foot. Then a large red garbage truck comes speeding into the parking lot. The truck loses control, crashes, and totals the truck: the truck disintegrates leaving behind a huge pile of trash. The Dreamer climbs up on a fence and starts to pick through the trash.

Then the Dreamer is inside a house with his old friend Dave Hanke. There is some communication about the accident that the Dreamer witnessed, and Dave leaves. Then the Dreamer is inside his old friend Richard’s house. Richard relays that he is storing oxygen tanks in his basement for the apocalypse. He says that the Dreamer’s sister Brittany is also storing tanks there. Then the Dreamer is inside his grandparent’s house with his old friend Rory. Rory intentionally spills water on the Dreamer. Then the Dreamer is inside another house. The Dreamer begins to carve sentences into the wall, four lines. Then the Dreamer hides the carving with a thin wall hanging. The Dreamer can still see the carving when the light is on it. He shuts off the light.

Then the Dreamer on outside at night on foot in an inner city. The Dreamer goes to a convenience store to get information. When he arrives, the foreign shopkeeper is on his way out. The shopkeeper is carrying an AK-47. The Dreamer asks if he is closed. The shopkeeper says yes. Then the Dreamer is walking in a parking lot with a foreign man. The foreign man shows the Dreamer a book that is supposed to be about Enlightenment. The book has golden text throughout. The Dreamer says that he would love to read this book. Then the Dreamer is in a backseat of a car in the parking lot. Then the Dreamer is outside of a single family home in a neighborhood, on a stake out. Then a boy, about seven years old, receives a present from a stranger. Then the Dreamer receives a present from a stranger wrapped in brown paper. The present has writing on the outside in black marker. The writing says something about how the author knows the Dreamer’s secrets. The Dreamer opens the box and there is more writing inside in black ink, another box inside of the box, and a bunch of papers including something like a map.

Context: Yesterday, I was listening to a TJL podcast about the alchemical stage: “Solutio” and wondered if I would have any alchemical themed dreams during my dreamworking process. Also yesterday, my Wife and I were talking about the murder rates in the inner cities of the world, including Washington, DC. We compost organic material in my household in order to be less wasteful. The day before, I saw a confederate flag flying outside of someone’s house, and feel ambivalent about that. The day before, we almost got into an accident when a truck driver with a big load came too fast around a blind corner.

Motifs: The dream character Abi previously prefigured a denial of bullying and aggression. The gas station has previously been a location of “convenience”, associated with potential aggression, contained. The dream character Daryl has previously been associated with irresponsibility, putting fun before work. The dream character Richard has been associated with medicine. Golden text has been associated with creative processes. The seven year old boy is a recent recurring character.

New Associations: I associate the pot boiling over as dangerous, but curious. I associate Raj with a king, with a strong sense of right and wrong. I associate interviewing someone with my own passing of judgement on them. I associate plastic with both waste and “plasticity” or potential for change. I associate Dave Henke with me, being a bully. I associate my sister Brittany with someone I’m estranged from, and have bullied in the past. I associate AK-47 with protection. In the dreams starting with “inside Richard’s house” there is a strong sense of sexuality, curiosity, and transgression. I associate the package wrapped in brown paper bag with the black writing on the outside with the way that we used to cover textbooks in school.

Feelings: danger and curiosity at the pot with the organic material inside; responsibility for my employees and potential employees, the necessity of making sound judgements; fear of shadow figures, thugs, and black men; judgement of Daryl for skiing with his shirt off; fear of judgement of others.

Interpretation: This is a dream about the Dreamer’s judging function. Something has been cooking for a long time in the unconscious, and yet it’s still alive and ready to hit the Dreamer in the third eye. The writing is on the wall. The Dreamer is making all kinds of “superior moral judgements”: about the eating habits of others, about people who work for him, about job candidates, about people who live in the city, about people who eat fast food, about throwing plastics in the trash, about people who ski with their shirts off, about the speed of the truck driver, about people’s flags and political beliefs, the exhaustive list goes on and on. The Dreammaker is suggesting an origin for this function, in the seven year old’s learning of “right and wrong” in line; and the origin of the fear of the judgement of “others” in the covering of textbooks with brown paper bags. The Dreammaker is also suggesting that the Dreamer has been using the oversized judgement function like an AK-47 to protect himself from his own shadows. Perhaps the Dreamer can just relax and take a breath, the medicine of the “oxygen tank”. Further, the Dreammaker is suggesting that the Dreamer might treat all of these “superior moral judgements” as “compost”, fodder for future organic material.