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OBrian of the Surface World replied to the topic Guild War…6? in the forum Announcements 7 years, 6 months ago
Sorry, @j-a-penrose,
I did not know how this was done and I thought the link you provided was where we were supposed to offer our thoughts or attempts. I am still getting used to this Blog panel and the multiple threads.
Here is what I wrote before:
I see color dancing. Where am I? I feel heavy. Tired. So tired. Jimmie says he’ll go. Who is Jimmie? A cousin or something. Someone I should know but can’t quite remember. Why can’t I figure these things out? The world hangs in the balance on me knowing… What is wrong with me? The tumor? Oh, don’t say tumor! You’ll make it happen. So many things to consider… Where was I? Am I… The thought eludes me. Who is Jimmie? Why does she call him that? Jimmie is such a kid’s name. He’s eighty years old, for crying out loud. Those colors… Such pretty, pretty colors. Is it cold in here? What is this…snow? The coat I brought…where is it? Why are my feet wet? Who turned on…? Who left the water running? My house is floating? Somebody, stop it! Well, don’t just stand there, DO SOMETHING? Why isn’t anyone listening to me? Why am I so small? The balloons are nice. Silver. Shiny, silver. Talking in the background. Who’s there? Can you hear me? BP’s falling? Who is BP? Another stupid Internet abbreviation! Ugh! Hate those! Exclude me until I can learn your stupid language! The distance is spreading. The gulf expanding. Can no one hear me? Is anyone listening? Ma’am. Mayhem. Who is mayhem? I don’t know anyone named… What?
“Ma’am, please wake up.”
“What? Who’re you?”
“I’m your nurse, dear. My name is Tilly. I work the night shift.”
“Oh.”
“Can you sit up for me, dear?” she asked, “It’s time to take your medicine.”
____
My thoughts were along the lines of disjointed and intervening thoughts which are typical of dream sequences.
Sometimes there are bits and pieces of information from our day, our memories, our last thoughts or last things we watched or read before falling asleep that become part of the mix in a dream. Some trivial problem that seems hyper-important within the dream, seems ridiculous and trivial upon waking. Often times superstitions and fears plague our dreams, or feelings of room temperature fluctuations can become integrated into a dream.As the son of a pastor, accompanying my father as he visited the sick and the elderly, we would frequent hospital rooms. Having sat with family members through surgeries, I also get the sense of the presence of threat and death that can lurk in the back of one’s mind when they are in a hospital room.
This simple idea struck me of how incongruous it is seeing cheerful flowers, colorful balloons and the idea of wondering and uncertainty attenuated to such a place that represents a crossroads of mortality or longevity.
So I wrote a sequence of a female protagonist’s dream, confusion within the dream, her memory of flowers and balloons in the dream connected with her waking reality, and a person she cannot fully place because her long-term memory has been impacted by something she is not quite certain of but fears might be a tumor. But to say it is to somehow make the possibility of it leave the dream and become real. The symbolism is there but not overt. Gaiety, festive colors dancing in celebration for what might be an ominous diagnosis or a dire one. The tumor if it does prove to be a tumor, might prove to have some beneficial quality. Something that affects her ability to see or hear things we cannot normally hear. The protagonist dreamer is predisposed to thinking her situation is ominous and dire, but it might just prove to be something else entirely. We’ve all heard the verse Romans 8:28 quoted rather glibly when someone has trouble in their lives, and it can be taken as callous and unsympathetic if quoted to one who is afraid or suffering through something tragic. There is a time and season for saying things at the right times and at the wrong times. When we speak the truth in love, we do need to focus on how what we say may be interpreted by the hearer, so it is important to let the Spirit guide our sharing for ministry. These were the thoughts behind my text above.
Here is a verse that seems to speak to what I am getting at:
“11 Timely advice is lovely, like golden apples in a silver basket.” [Proverbs 25:11 NLT]Imagine this woman’s predicament. She is alone, wakes up in a hospital room in the middle of the night, is greeted by a stranger who wakes her to give her medicine. That is all we know except from the clues planted in the dream sequence.
BP is Blood Pressure, yet even in her sleep the woman picks up on it, mistakes it for something else, but still, it is there. The dancing colors could either be a floral arrangement or the mylar balloons dancing in the cold air she feels, thinking she is in snow. Hospital rooms tend to be cold because cold suppresses bacterial activity in the same way a refrigerator slows the decay of food. Water is running, which could be the nurse entering her room while she is asleep filling the ice bucket or cup that she will want the patient to drink to be able to take her medicine. Even in sleep, we pick up ambient clues of low-level activity that may not wake us. If she is medicated, it may be causing the confusion she is having.If the conclusion is to be that she has a fatal metastasizing tumor, the question would be how might God still work something even as terrible as this, for good? A hard question, I know.
Also, if there are flowers and mylar balloons, might that not also indicate that there is someone who cared enough to bring them to her room? Could it be this Jimmie she is having problems remembering?
These were some of my thoughts writing this sequence.












