are we losing our minds?

…or just keeping them in our pockets.

Filed under: life, random, thoughts , geek, memory, minds

to the teeth

Last night I had an anxiety dream, this is the second one I’ve had in the last 2 weeks and before these it had been years since I had one last. Both of these dreams involve losing a tooth. I know that this is one of the archetypal dreams that Freud talks about, meaning that it is a fairly common dream occurrence. I have read and heard all kinds of interpretations of this kind of dream ranging from being concerned with appearance, potency or finances— but none of these make sense with my dream.

In my dream I am in my studio, frantically working. A large digital clock with glowing red numbers ticking backwards towards zero is hung on the wall. I specifically remember the time remaining as being 90 minutes and forty three seconds (90:43). Although I am alone I am aware that I only have this amount of time to finish the work for a critique— apparently I am in grad school in this dream. I look around my studio and there is nothing that resembles finished work, only sketches and ideas on paper litter the tables. I remember feeling nauseous and anxious with my heart thrumming wildly in my chest. I hear a knock on the door and standing there are my wife and daughter. My feelings of anxiety are replaced by a feeling of guilt, they are coming to get me… I am supposed to be done and ready to go do something with them.

The dream jumps at this point and I am walking Karen and Teagan to the car, Karen is reassuring me, telling me to take my time and not to worry. As they get in the car I feel a pain in my right top molar and realize I am clenching my teeth (both in the dream and in my sleep). When I realize I am clenching my teeth in the dream I stop, feeling my tooth loosen from my gums as I release the tension of my jaw muscles. The tooth falls slightly in my mouth and clicks as it touches the corresponding tooth under it, still clinging slightly to the upper gum. A feeling of panic returns as I reach in my mouth to pull out the tooth. In order to extricate it I must almost tear it out, the action is accompanied by a brief searing pain. Once out, I stare at the tooth and notice a fragment of red gum tissue adhering to one side of the tooth. I immediately feel flush, and can feel blood in my mouth. As I walk alone back towards my studio I stop every few feet to spit out the blood and gently probe the void in my mouth with the tip of my tongue. After the third or 4th stop I feel something sharp in the void, causing me to examine the tooth again. This time when I look at it I notice that it is missing the roots. Instead of being a whole tooth it is just the cap of a tooth, hollow inside with almost architectural supports that are distinctly untooth-like.  As I keep looking closer I feel a jolt of current running through my body. I am looking at the tooth that has come from my mouth and I am seeing the shapes and structures that I am currently using in my work (outside of the dream)

Again the dream cuts and I am back in my studio the clock now reads 60:13 and is still counting backwards. The panic is back and I feel like I am sweating. I actually feel like I am on the verge of tears feeling in adequate as a father and as an artist and it is at this point that I wake up, soaked with sweat, heart throbbing and feeling as if I am on the verge of gushing tears.

One of the things I learned in the dreaming class I took in college is that the way you feel in the dream is often more important than what is actually happening. In this case: anxiety, fear and profound lack of confidence and competence both as a father and as an artist pretty much sum it up. The definition of the word ‘tooth’ combined with my feelings and the scenario in the dream make me feel like this dream is mirroring a situation in my waking life. The loss of tooth would leave me at a disadvantaged to process food and get what I need to sustain myself. If the metaphor extends outside the dream maybe my fear is literally that of not being able to do something that I feel is necessary to me. In my class I also learned that teeth dreams are often about transitions, as we lose our teeth as part of our transition to adolescence and ultimately adulthood . I think this is ultimately all about my decision to pursue a grad degree beginning in the summer. I guess somewhere inside me I am afraid of failing, afraid that I may not have what it takes to do what I need to do. It seems that I am concerned about having time, confidence and resolve to be able to be the father I need to be and the artist I want to be simultaneously. I noticed that I also used the word ‘guilt’ to describe my feelings at one point in the dream, and I do feel a bit of guilt/selfishness when I think about grad school— especially from a financial stand point. For me this dream is reassurance in an odd way. If this situation has made its way to my dreams in such a strong way it makes me more sure that it is something I must do, and these fears and anxieties are important things to not only acknowledge but also to address as I move closer to making the dream of grad school a reality.

Filed under: artsy., family, life, personal., random, thoughts , anxiety, art, control, dreams, fear, grad school, interpretation, teeth

unthirsty bug

So we’ve had our Deisel bug (see earlier post) for just over a week and a half and I am having fun driving it. But the thing that is surprising to me is just what 45+ miles to the gallon feels like in practical usage. I filled the car up on the night we bought it (11 days ago) I have driven it about 230 miles in and around town as well as on the highway and I still have half a tank of gas left. I must admit, my inner geek is eager to calculate the actual gas mileage when I refill the tank.

Filed under: life, portland., random, thoughts, travel