Sleep & Bill Hayes

A new discovery for me in Bill Hayes, the paramour of our own Oliver Sacks whom I must have written about in here somewhere. That’s not the point of it of course but only an anchoring place. Somewhere for us to tether a reference. Not so much for the reader as for my own needs I’m afraid. I’m not at all sure that’s a universal need. Although it (a reference tether) makes sense.

From Bill, as reported in Marginalia: “I was born dreaming. Deep in REM sleep, I was taken from the womb, my closed eyes furiously scanning for images that could never be retrieved, redreamed, or remembered. In this regard, I was identical to every baby. With a slap to the ass, it was over. Birth jolted me from a state of sublime unconsciousness to which I’ve spent the rest of my life struggling to return.”

And there it is. So well put. Hence our struggle for the illusive, the dream, Death. The Big Sleep.

Bill writes about this in Sleep Dreams which I have already ordered, naturally. A simple turn of some screw in the mind that allows me to act without thought when it comes to the purchase of some book that will further allow me to enter into that Other of the sublime—the right book with the right words. I’ll report back on the read, though I fully expect it to be delicious.

Before closing, a further thought. Did you know that Nietzsche believed that dreams are an evolutionary time machine for the human mind? Oh my. So much to think about. So much to dream about.

Today—or—Synchronicity Unbound

Posted by Ravenous Butterflies

Thomas Eakins – Amelia van Buren with a Cat on her Shoulder.

“As a child I felt myself to be alone, and I am still, because I know things and must hint at things which others apparently know nothing of, and for the most part do not want to know. Loneliness does not come from having no people about one, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important to oneself, or from holding certain views which others find inadmissible.” ~ Carl Jung

Today I am attending the Jung Platform “Dreams and your Personal Journey.” So of course I am being inundated with things Jung and dreams. Synchronicity unbound! The course is 3 videos per day for 4 days.

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And no, I am not ignoring the political transformation of the USA, nor am I removed from the fray. I have rejoined the fray in fact, as speaking out is also Action, and sometimes Action is not only required, but demanded. More directly on this later.

Good Night

And now, dear friends, a sweet good night, and thoughts of Rilke to hold us tight.

And once more from our dear friend, Donna May. May we all dream on with thoughts of snow and angel wings. And may we plumb the depths of our own souls, our own center which cannot hold.

Once More, Into The Breach…

I don’t know; wish I did. All that and oh well.

  • I seem to have floundered off the page again. I would be worried if it mattered.
  • Strange places in the hovel of memories: 1. Years back—where? Was it Michigan? When I lived in the house on the 10 acre woods. The first dream was that of the whippets. Whippets had long been of some significance although I didn’t know of what. They frequently appeared in my life and were witnessed by the boy and the girl. And then, I dreamed I found a pair of them and took them into the garage there, to the house on the edge of that wood, to wait for their people to arrive and rescue them. (Whippets always appeared in a pair, in reality and in dreams.) And so they did. The next day, out walking with Kate-the-golden-one, down that country road, appeared two whippets, trotting alone and in tandem. I coaxed them into the garage and phoned a radio station then playing at the house, to give the information and request an announcement. The song to go along with the find was “The Happy Wanderer.” (It was a station of oldies.) Not long after the announcement there was a phone call from the whippet people who then came to get them. Of course they had just lost them, of course they just happened to be listening to that station.
  • 2. The dream that night was of the raven. Raven or crow, I tend to favor ravens. I found a raven on that very country road, a wounded creature who could not fly. I took it in and gave it great care and nursing. When I was not at home I kept it in my utility room so it could be enclosed and yet have some room. Safety, freedom, and constraint. Noble intentions, noble gifts. Except the beautiful iridescent creature tore a hole right through the wall. There was a plaster and dry wall and two-by-four mess blown clear through to the kitchen. The next day, walking down that same country road, a neighbor came out to ask me if I wanted to take in a crow. He had found an injured one and couldn’t care for it himself. Was I interested? I gracefully declined. I didn’t want the mess of the feathered beauty tearing apart the house, leaving the white mist of drywall powder to cover us there.
  • It is after all, a murder of crows and an unkindness of ravens.
  • I told the kids who told me I made too much of such things, which I did. I was crazed to know the meaning of them. I had one foot on shore and one at sea…into a fog of meaning and being, into a dream world not called, delivered without quest or anchor. But I could not read the sign. How will I ever know if everything was a dream, if anything was real?
  • Last night I got up at four a.m. to read The Winter’s Tale. I wanted to understand what the king said at the end, when he touched the statue of his wife—old now, and gone—and he said she was warm. Who does that—this waking to read? Isn’t that crazy even for me?

Still, it looks like red rock canyon. So many places of country roads, so many places left behind. No one then to love the pilgrim soul, or the moments of sad grace.