I had two dreams last night – both of which I know came from this Mystic River fog.<\/p>\n
1. I had a dream about Deirdre P. – a girl I went to grade school with, a tough girl, a nice girl – I went to some of her birthday parties. She was a tomboy. An old soul. Kind of like Jodie Foster when she was a kid. And she died maybe … 10 years ago or something like that. In wierd circumstances, I believe, although I don’t know any details. I am not haunted by Deirdre – we were friends for about 5 minutes when we were 9 years old. But there she was. In my dream. Clear as day. Sitting at the bottom of a flight of steps which were coated in ice, looking over her shoulder back up at me. She was a kid in the dream. Not a grown woman. A kid, just looking up at me.<\/p>\n
2. I had a dream about an old flame of mine. A long-standing flame. We’re actually still friends, in a kind of invisible “I know you’re out there” kind of way. I see him when he visits New York. The guy is a big MANIAC – tall, with crazy black hair – who, as a human being, obviously has insecurities, and flaws, and fears, but he never shows them. Or, if he does show them, it’s never in a neurotic worried way, he does it in a brash masculine way, like: “DAMN! I am feeling REALLY INSECURE right now!” He proclaims his humanity in a loud voice, and everybody bursts into laughter. I like being with him because he never cares what people think. And he also made it his GOAL IN LIFE to make me laugh. Even now, when we get together for drinks on his once-a-year trip to NYC, he makes it his #1 priority to make me laugh.<\/p>\n
I rarely dream about him but I did last night. He didn’t look like himself, but it wasn’t his features that were different. It looked like something had collapsed – inside of him<\/i>. Which was the worst tragedy in the world to me. I never ever want that wild free soul to collapse, become small, become scared. I stared at his eyes, I stared at the diminished soul in his eyes – and thought: where is that brash confidence? Where is that loud arrogant I-could-own-the-world-if-I-chose-to stance? Where is my old friend? Where did he go?<\/p>\n
It is only now, looking back on these two dreams, put together, that I can see where they came from.<\/p>\n
Mystic River.<\/u><\/p>\n
I’m working on writing about it, in more depth. Maybe that will help me loosen its grip on me.<\/p>\n
\n