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b | Barb Sanders | Two men and I are traveling to T City to visit Dora again. I had visited lately and it was very enjoyable. The one man is sort of Derek but is sort of Kyle, but I call him Dwight, although it seems to me his name may be something else. The other man is his younger brother and is pretty much Kyle's younger brother, the one that molested Charla. I ask what vehicle we are in and he says it's their Dad's vacation camper. It is a square box-like thing with tiny kitchen appliances. I try to explain how to get to Dora's new place, called Paradise Cove, but I can't remember, so I am trying to read the maps. I can't seem to find T City on the map and I try repeatedly. Now the younger brother says, "I'm exhausted from driving; it has cramped me up," and I look at the other brother who says, "I can't, I'm too tired." I say, "Maybe I can, is it power steering and brakes?" "Yes." I try to steer, but it is a small crank handle and isn't very responsive. We are getting nowhere fast. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Ethan comes to my bedroom. He is a tired, older man, sad and lonely. His wife doesn't understand him. I have two girls, one maybe five and one a baby, who romp energetically around on the bed as Ethan tries to get on my bed and tries to make me feel sorry for him so I'll go with him. I'm not going. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am working for a company where you play water sport games and that lets the officers know who to promote and who will be good leaders and workers. I play good and hard. I am approved. Now we go into a buffet where the food choices are endless and bountiful. I am filling my plate with breads and pretzels and I'm looking over the vegetable tray but I don't choose anything. I wonder how I'll be able to eat all this food. I seem to choose only the things I usually eat. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Archie comes to me and wants me to dance with his group again. I tell him this woman director has been working with me and I'll go with her. He is jealous and upset. Oh well. I move on. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Theresa/Cherokee is driving a pickup and I am the passenger. I see us driving very fast across the canyon to get to the event. We overslept. I see her dark hair very clearly; she is vibrant and pretty. I see my gray hair. Now I arrive with my little girl. We'd been in such a rush we hadn't taken time to eat breakfast or take my pills. I walk, holding the girl in my arms. I find my yellow pill box and take the pills, only the vitamin, the calcium, and the hormones. I put them aside, sort of checking if I had enough to make it through the stay. Now I see the group, singing is over and someone already moved the pickup. I am looking for some breakfast. I choose the left hall and open a door to see a smoke-filled room with an annoyed woman in it. I apologize because I hadn't realized this was now someone's private living quarters. I now go down the hall on the right. I see an Indian woman who gives me $1.10 in tokens as I can't find my purse. I assure her I'll pay her back. She says, "Go to the farmer's wife. She still has breakfast." I say, "Is this enough money?" She smiles at my concern. I find the farmer's wife and am asking the girl what she would like to eat. The girl isn't particularly interested in any of my suggestions. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am in some mad nightmare where tremendous forces of hate and violence are coming at me and I must fight it off by sending back blasts of intense love. People come at me, wanting to kill me and I send back intense love, trying not to succumb to the hate and violence. It is pretty overwhelming. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Michael J Fox is a split or multiple personality. I am his sister, who may be a part of his madness. He and another male part merge. It becomes obvious that he desperately needs to be around me and maybe merge with me too, but the merge could mean my death. He's relentlessly coming after me. As he is about to merge with me, I wake up with a massive irregular heart beat problem. It takes a moment before it evens out (that part is real and not just the dream). | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Darcy is trying to sneak into my father's car to use it to go somewhere. My father and I are nearby and ask her what she thinks she's doing, like we caught her red-handed. She explains she wants to go and talk to a girl who was sexually abused and explain to her that it's OK to tell people. She didn't know that when it happened to her and wants to encourage the girl. I feel bad I was so negative and suspicious of her and say shyly, "I wish you would talk about it more to me. I'd like to know more." She is friendly, but somehow avoids telling me anything. Now I want to go see an old wooden sidewalk I used to walk as a child. I find it and walk it to the end and admire the wooden panels folded up at the end. The wood is beautiful. Now a bunch of people are there and I am telling the man operator of the sidewalk my story of how we'd come here to meet my father and then go swim (my brother and me) off the end of the sidewalk. This was somewhere near N City. It was a happy, nostalgic memory and the people are all gladdened to hear it. They want to videotape the cute story for publicity. I let them. Later I'm asking my mother what my father wants for his birthday present. She shows me pies and cakes and finally some chocolate fudge. I choose the fudge, it's easier to take along. Darcy gives him a cute child's video with mermaids on the cover. I had given him one entitled "Bambi's King" or something like that. It had a sweet cover of lots of little girl mermaids seated around. He is very happy and I ask him, "Why the mermaids?" He says the photo reminds him of a group of women campers and he wants to use the photo to create some photo story of a past happy event. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am a beautiful young woman like Audrey Hepburn, in a basic black dress, black heels and all the men watch me as I walk with grace and elegant beauty. Women are in a line and going down a steep cement stairway, no sides or rails. We then step into the water, which is thigh deep. We each come to a small water faucet like fountain and bend and take a drink. It is some ritual. As it is my turn, I see an old woman sneak in and take my turn. I graciously let her, even holding down the push button to let the water flow. Then I bend to take my drink. The woman whose turn would be next shoves me away saying, "I gave up my turn when I let the old woman drink." I disagree and try to take my drink. She keeps shoving me, so I turn and fight her, socking her in the face and knocking her down. The watching men really like and admire my feisty attitude. But the woman, her name is Betty, hates me now and keeps relentlessly coming after me. I fight her again and escape to my small black convertible sports car. She chases me through the city streets. Finally I outfox her by turning into a very narrow alley between two huge stone houses. It is a steep incline. Betty is driving a big car so she doesn't fit. Now she has friends and is walking down toward me. I tap on the small ancient glass windows, but no one responds. I pick up my black cellular phone and call 911. Sympathetic cops ask where I am and I try to describe it, then I drive away and Betty still pursues. My roads are disappearing; then I have to drive up a dirt hill, and then a sand-filled, half paved road where construction is going on. I can't seem to find a main road to get back to the city. Lots of water is pouring down on one sandy road like they are constructing stuff. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am in an airplane going home and am traveling with a disabled man. We somehow find or went to look at property that could be a nice place for him to live and an OK investment. Somehow the plane returns and we get off and agree and sign papers to buy this property, and now we are flying home. A man like Loren C. comes out of a room, sleepy like he just woke up and he is shivering. He greets a tall, sharp-faced man who looks like John, my therapist. He calls him "Omni" as in Omnipotent, the leader, a joke. Loren says he didn't realize the cabin they bought was so primitive and cold. He is unhappy with recent purchase. I am startled to realize I bought some property also. It is so isolated and out in the eastern Washington high desert. What was I thinking? "John" sits next to me and says, "Can you love me?" He is in love with me. I smile and say, "I like you." He has his shirt off and puts his arm around me. We kiss and then he says, "I see, you don't love me." The kiss was very uninteresting and neutral. He will wait, hoping. We arrive back. I am looking at a bunch of map- like papers he gave me. I decide I will visit him, since on the paper is a sort of puzzle where when you read the words he asks me to visit his home. But I can't figure out where it is, somewhere in Washington. Later, Loren won't talk to me as he's mad because he doesn't like the property. I am about to leave and he calls me over to smile and say it's not your fault I had different expectations. I thank him for telling me that. I feel relieved of my guilt. The scene shifts and I've built a beautiful home on the property, which has a river on it. My bedroom is partly submerged in the river, built with Plexiglas corner so I can see the river life underneath. I wake up, afraid for a moment because some huge-eyed thing is staring at me through the glass. After my fright, I appreciate the beauty of this view. John is in the other room and somehow I know we are a mere ten miles from a big city, even though I am out there in the boondocks. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am in a spaceship that is trapped out there. An alien is working with Capt. Janeway to help set up a beam out transporter situation for our rescue. We go through maybe three or four different beam outs that feel weird and are risky. We end up safely back on earth. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am sitting on a small back porch up a flight of stairs. From my place, I can safely watch the bull riding events. One Brahma bull is mad as hell and his hair knot on his back stands straight up. He's running through the crowd and nearly getting people. Now a bull rider is on him and a cowboy on a horse. I trying to rope him. I am amazed that two events are being done simultaneously. Now the bull rider, a very charming, good-looking man, is walking toward the house. He is talking with his pal. I watch as he almost decides to go up my back stairs, then turns and goes back around to the front door. I am going to make a pudding and ask my father to bring me a mixer. Now another good-looking cowboy comes up my back stairs. He is Rod Taylor. He stops to flirt and chat. He talks about his pain and I tell him I have RA. We talk happily, obviously flirting and liking each other. He asks me if I always stay up here, and I say mostly. I'm not stupid. If I was down in the crowd, I could get hurt and not see so well. He is mixing up some pain relief balm that smells good. We are very attracted to each other, a promising love affair. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Ellie is going to do a strip tease in a contest. She's the first one up. She is 200 lbs. and confident. She gets up on the platform, which is a rickety series of platforms. She begins. I call to Ginny, who is in the other room trying to phone her husband. I save her a seat. There are lots of college kids on bleachers, then my wheelchair and one armchair. I stand up in the armchair and Ginny sits in the wheelchair. I feel a bit embarrassed for Ellie because she's so fat and so enthusiastically naive. But she's doing OK. The crowd is very quiet and nonresponsive. In the middle of her strip, her platforms shift and she falls between two of them with one leg. It throws her off a bit, but she comes back, very plucky, to try again, I can see the platforms are very precarious. She tries again and quickly slips again. This time she lands on the floor on her back, breaking a small drawer. She lays there, annoyed.The crowd is curiously noncaring. I call out, "Are you all right?" She says, "Yeah, but it's over." The next fat woman comes out. I notice she is pretty, as was Ellie, even though very fat. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Howard wants me to go with him and read a sexy children's book. He hopes to get me aroused so we can have sex. I would like to do sex, but as soon as he's in the picture, everything shuts down in disgust. Later I pass a medical test which proves I have quick and normal arousal responses, but it's quickly interrupted by a shut down because of Howard. The test also confirms I am heterosexual, very heterosexual. Later, I am visiting Ginny and trying to take my pills and have breakfast. I'm having a hard time. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I see a child, possibly Charla, going to school and realize a man with a gun is there in the crowd to harm the children. I am outraged and run through the crowd and hit him from behind, knocking him down and taking his shotgun. He gets up and runs, then turns and has a bazooka. He aims at me as I aim at him. We fire at the same time. I see the blue ball of fire and duck, so it only grazes my side. He is hit, but does not fall. We fire again and again. He walks toward me until I fire point blank into his belly. He finally dies. I am rewarded by being given the powers of a fairy. I am full-sized and me, but now I have cute wings and sparkle dust. I can fly and turn invisible. So I decide to get rid of all the nuclear weapons in the world. I decide to remove the nuclear waste buried in Washington on the reservation. I fly there, go invisible and cause all those barrels of radioactive material out billions of miles into outer space, being sure that it isn't on a path that will eventually drift into a planet and cause harm. I then must retreat as the men are looking for me. I try to fly away and realize this was a huge job and I am exhausted, my powers temporarily depleted. I can't turn invisible so I hide and wait for my powers to return, so I can take on the next nuclear task. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am a young Eleanor Roosevelt, my waist is slimming down, my pairs of thick glasses are the buttons I close my waist band with. My new husband notices I am looking more pretty and desirable. I go to take a bath and realize I have no privacy now, as it is the White House. The door to the bathroom is open and people could walk through. I realize I am naive and have much I should lean, so I don't accidentally embarrass the presidency. I try to gather up my pills that fell into the bathtub. Now I am picking up my things and see that a box of children's books aren't mine. Oliver North/Jerome sits behind me. He is called Colneral. He is dishonest and feels bad about it. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I think I had been ill and am recovering. I want Charla to go to the Publications Dept. again and get me some copies of pictures of specific notables like Deepak Chopra and Dr. Spock and so on. I decide at the last moment to go with her. I'd just gotten my hair cut and it is brown and the bangs are curly. So I follow her out to the hall and we get the elevator. We get in and Charla, the little girl in the TV movie last night, who is precocious and has temper tantrums. She sees a backpack on the floor and says its her mommy's. Then she orders a few things off the back wall shelves. The attendant gets them for her; it's like a store. She had earned a few dimes during my illness running errands. The elevator goes up for a long time and then it goes straight like a car on an old road. The attendant says the department is now in the Brown Building downtown. I am quite surprised and think this is a good way to get a free ride downtown when I want to run errands. I'll just pretend I'm going to the Publications Dept. We get to a hallway. On the left wall are signs. The first one says "October Games Free Software Month." The next one says "Las Prunes Month." We get to the department and we go in. I say to a woman clerk, "I'd like Xerox copies of some pictures..." and she interrupts, "Now there's the problem. You have to pay for those copies and the person you pay is not here. He is on duty..." and she lists three times. I suggest we try and locate the pictures and then later I'd come back and make copies. I am annoyed. Earlier I was a bit amazed at how far the ride had been and a bit chagrined I'd sent the little girl there for errands so often. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Richard R is inviting me to a snazzy party and is giving me directions to get there. It's not far away, but the directions seem complicated: four right turns in a row. I say, "But that depends on where the right turns start. I notice M. Street is right outside my door. I am wearing a blouse and no bra and the nipple of one breast peeks out. I try to cover it up. Now he decides to show me how to get there and we go out. I would go straight on M. Street but he points out ugly construction. That is terrible to go through construction, so he says, "We'll take this turn and take the shortcut." We are on a gravel road and I realize we'd made a turn and I didn't note the name of the corner or a landmark. How will I find my way again? But we are there now, and lots of round tables are set up with place settings and name tags and little gifts for each person. He says, "Remember, your place is _______," something that starts with a C. I wander around the crowded area looking for my spot. I finally find it way in the back, where it's the hardest to get to. I smile at the irony. Of course it would be so. But I have several books there waiting for me, special gifts. A woman is jealous. Now I am home and a young woman named Theresa and Richard R (now a woman) have a heavy discussion. Richard is the woman's daughter that gave the party. The mother is gravely ill. Theresa was adopted when she was in the 7th grade and the mother and she really talk and understand each other well. It is a good loving relationship and Richard is jealous, as he is the real blood daughter, but it isn't as deep or loving for him. Now a man named Larry (like Raul) comes in all intense and jovial and charming. I like him and want him to stay. He sees Theresa (now called Amy) and the mother at my house and sighs. He'd rather avoid them because it is such an emotional drain on him as he takes the clown caring role to cheer them up. He goes in to do that, as their brother is ill with AIDS and they are worried about him. I say to Larry as he comes out, "Where are you going?" He says, "Off to a summer vacation spot to have fun." I tell him I feel sadness for him as I wonder whose shoulder he cries on. Who takes care of him? He keeps me at a emotional distance and rushes away quickly. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I, the dreamer, is watching a scene. I seem to identify with the married man. A woman and a man get married after a short, but loving, courtship. Soon after they are married, they begin to have misunderstandings and fights. They are always angry at each other and can't seem to reconcile it. They are miserable, yet they love each other. There is another man, an architect, who loves the woman and she goes to visit him. The jealous husband, who has another kind of career, follows her and comes into the house. The two men talk. The husband is angry and belligerent, but after a while the other man begins to understand that the husband is a good man, but hurt. So he helps the husband understand, and brings the woman and the husband back together, even though he still loves her. But now he is best friends with the husband and cares as much for him. The husband and the woman go out to the car to drive home when the woman's parents come to get in the back seat. They are argumentative and negative at the husband, who in his new-found understanding, doesn't tolerate it anymore. He tells them to shut up. The woman at first is upset and then understands that is right. She smiles at the husband. [BL] | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am in a class, maybe writing class. A woman is setting up some sort of conference. She is taking special interest in making me comfortable. She gives me a notebook and papers and a candle and a potted plant and other amenities. I gather them up one by one with Charla's help and take them to my desk, but it takes up two desks worth of room. I'm the only one this is permitted with. Now it's time to go to the first activity. I get on a sailboat she is trying to drive. At first it won't budge from the dock, but then as she turns the wheel around and around. It starts to go, but the channel is very obstructed with things like wooden boxes and so on. We bump our way through them, she turning the wheel sharply from one end to the other. It fairly spun in her hands. We get off and walk down a path to a house. Inside the ceremonies are beginning. Each person has special duties or tasks to do. One man is reading a religious paper. Someone asks me, Where's my copy?" I say, "Oh, I left it on my desk. I already read it." Then I feel like I would like to join in with the man, reciting passages with him, but don't have my copy. Then a man in a wheelchair dressed in drag comes in. His mother tells him to go on back out and continue with the activity. He takes his black, curly wig off. He is partially bald. He feels a little silly dressed in women's clothes. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A married couple are fighting. The man is cold and selfish. The woman may be Asian. I see a baby, their baby, fall off a high dock into an ocean. I am afraid for the baby. The mother sees it too and dives quickly off the dock into the waters. His granny did too, but she's more hindrance than help. I feel dread and fear as I hope I don't have to witness the drowning of this baby, and there is not a thing I can do to help. I watch as the mother strongly swims over to him and saves him, then let's him float underwater, teaching him to swim, so if this happens again, he will be safe. I am anxious and want her to bring the baby up to safe, dry land right now, but I realize her strategy is best. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A rather stupid, lanky man is asking me questions. I hold a package with a small plastic bag of white beads in it. It is a beading kit. He asks me what the words on the package says. I say, "Stretched string beads." He asks how many beads there are. Are there enough to bead a whole shirt? I answer gruffly, "How would I know? It doesn't say." I am annoyed with his attitude and questions. The man says, "Why don't you lighten up?" I realize I am being sharp and grumpy, but I say, "Because I don't want to," which is true. This IS the way I feel and I don't want to change it right now. [BL] | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am in the M City house, sleeping in my bedroom. I open my eyes and see my "dad" walking up to my open bedroom door. He is tall and lanky like Nate. He is so tall, his head is above the doorjamb. I feel fear. He is going to harass me. He then walks down the stairs to go to the bathroom. I sneak out of my room and run into my brother's room (actually the room my parents had). I crawl under the covers with one of my brothers trying to hurriedly pull up the covers over me. He's coming back up the stairs and I know a part of my shoulder may be visible. I know this won't work and I'll probably got my brothers in trouble too, but I stay there. He comes in and looks around. I think he sees me, but lets me be. He leaves. I go quickly back into my bedroom to the closet to try and change clothes before he comes back. As I pull a dress off a hanger, I am standing in the closet, which seems to have lots of room. A weird-looking girl comes and watches me. I tell her to go away. I pull on my dress, which I wonder if it is too fancy and will call attention to myself. I go downstairs to the kitchen where my mother is fixing French toast for breakfast. She wants me to do something and is grumpy. [BL] | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am in a world where everyone else are aliens in human bodies like in the Body Snatchers. I can trust no one. Everyone else is emotionless and ready to get me. I run, driving my car. This goes on for a long time. Now I am staying at some man's house. I am sad and stoic, alone and getting on with it. My old lover comes by. I am in the back seat of a car. I think my mother is there too. The man is in the passenger side of the front seat. He is tall and lanky like Nate and like "Albert" of the movie, "Legends of the Fall" which I saw last night. He is sad and loving. He wants me back. I find it hard to resist, but I must. This is sweet and exquisite torture, to want to melt into his arms and yet feel compelled not to. He is looking around the car and trying to make small talk to keep me there, counting the number of paper cups there and so on. I smile saying, "There used to be more, before I cleaned up the car." He says, "Let me help you on with your coat." He does, and I let him. It is a poignant and slow motion move where he puts my arms into the coat like you would a child, and as I sit there with my arms out, letting him, my body and arms are in a gesture of opening up to embrace him. I feel great sadness and a desire to throw my arms around him, but I stoically hold still and let this moment pass. I get out of the car and walk back to the house. My "mother," a dark-haired woman is there standing on the sidewalk, being somehow derisive and putting me down. I walk past her. As I step up on the first step of the porch, I realize there is mud on my shoes, which are soled moccasins. I try to rub them on the indoor/outdoor carpet mat. My roommate, sort of a Bill R guy, comes out. I show him I am being a "good girl" and cleaning my feet off before coming in. He loves me too and smiles. The same feeling of sadness and stoic denial that love is impossible for me is there. As I scrape the mud off, I also accidentally scrape off the soles. He bends down gently to see the damage. He holds my foot and I see it is a small baby's foot in a silly sock, like the black one I have with red lip prints or kiss prints on it. He says he will get me some new shoes. I feel grateful, touched by his love for me. I fight to remain stoic and walk into the house. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I interview for a job as a secretary for this college professor who has a terrible reputation as a womanizer who "feeds" on the young college girls. I am a sophisticated, together woman in white high heels and a business suit. I am also beautiful and tailored. I step through a room that might have been an old gym room in PE filled with a jumble of boxes and crates. I get to his office, which is also crowded with furniture and so on. My desk area is in the far back of the room, to the left as I walk in the door and all his stuff is to the right of the door. But the door opens to the side of the room, so as I sit at my desk and see him at his, facing me at the other end of the room, the door is on my right. He says to me in a jeering tone that he has his ways and if I can't handle being around it, then I need to leave. I smile and say calmly, "No problem." He hires me, now very curious about my calm and content demeanor. I do not disapprove of him or put him down, even though I don't believe what he is doing is right, but it is his life and I make no thought or attempt to try and change him. He feels that and is intrigued. I come to work the next day and clean my desk area. It is spotless, organized and ready for work in strong contrast to his area of cluttered furniture and so on. I sit, ready to work. He now wants to reform his ways and is falling in love with me and must earn my respect. I see two ugly rugs on his floor. He says, "I want new rugs. Go buy me some." I laugh and say, "Sure. What colors do you like?" He says patterns or designs. I write this down with a marker pen on an old rug piece tacked to the wall. He loves this because it is so unconventional. He says, "Maybe dandelions." I say, "Cute and fuzzy, or botanical?" He loves the way I banter matter-of- factly with him, not arguing or persuading him to anything I might prefer. I then go walking out to find the store. I come to the "main street" of the university area. A slick brick pattern is in the raised center of the road. I start to haul myself over the four-foot high raised area, throwing one leg over and scrambling, then I think, "This isn't going to work," and walk an extra block out of my way to the stairs over it. I go into the store. It is a huge area with many cubicles or desks where beautiful merchandise sits. People go sit at the desk/cubicle and admire different pieces as they decide to buy or not, lots of people. I see some exquisite glass vases and realize this is an auction or estate sale of very expensive material. I go to the back of the room to ask a clerk where are the carpets. He points off to a central area where I see bits of color. I then am distracted by other fine things to see. I decide I'll go see the carpets later. I brush against a cello case and it nearly falls. I catch it and put it back. Then I see what looks like tall, thin, fine, dark wood cabinets. I go to look, touching one that tumbles against the others, almost causing a chain reaction. The once thin case opens, as is a bass fiddle case. I get it all put back and am attracted to a revolving set of walls which have pillows hanging on them. I look and then move on to a table where there are books and cameras and so on. I pick up a fat book with a thick cellophane plastic cover. I see it is a working script book for a classic movie called "My Dear ____" (maybe wife). I am intrigued because I had chosen this movie to dissect to learn how to do a movie. The added attraction to the book is that there are special insider notes about how the "real" directors do it. I look at the price. $15.00 seems a lot. Then I see I got mixed up and that is the price of a book called Wizard of Oz. I then see the right price is $11.95. I decide it's worth it and take the book. Then I see a camera, a Lieka small portable. I turn it over and try to see the back. It says Polaroid. It was $132.00 dollars when new, but I can buy it for $12.00. I choose it too. Then I find an intriguing pottery piece. It is like a small compact vase to put food in like a snack tray. The beauty of it is that it unfolds so that the main vase part holds bread sticks and dip. The other petals fold out to create a trail of platters, each a different colored pottery to hold the veggies. It is adorable. I take it too. Later I take all this back to the office and show the man, who is now like Derek. He looks at the pottery piece and says, "Well, you'll have trouble with Charla. She'll want to play with it all the time." I say, "Oh well, I'll keep it anyway. I'll put it away when she comes to visit." He chuckles at me for getting so many things I like when sent on the mission of getting him a carpet. (which I also did get). | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A good-looking young man, maybe 29 years old, seems very charming. Dovre and I are attending some growth seminar. He joins us. Then, he starts exhibiting psychotic behaviors. He grabs a doll and holds it to his penis and pees on it, right in front of me, while smiling charmingly at me after he had just violently ravaged the doll. Then again he grabs my daughter, Dovre, as she is laying on the floor, only she becomes another doll. I grab the doll and say, "No. You can't." We wrestle over the doll and I force it away from him. He is intense and single-minded. I go over and whisper to the woman who is running the workshop, "We have a psychotic person here; get security." She leaves to do that. Then I see Paul C and two of his men who walk up to me nonchalantly. He says, "Where is he?" I look around. He had gone outside, to pee in the woods. I see him coming back toward the door. We are standing in the open door and he sees the big, obviously police men. He veers away and starts to walk away. I try to walk out to entice him back in a friendly manner, but he's onto us. I am annoyed at Paul and his men for being so obvious. A good-looking man, one of the security ones, only more feminine-looking and a slight build, says, "Maybe I can convince him to come over." I say, "You are probably right. I'm pretty sure he is homosexual and schizophrenic. Watch out for him, he is very charming on the outside and dangerous as hell." | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am hearing a radio report about a new kind of ski lift that uses pressurized air to shoot the person straight up to the high place, and then it's a roller coaster kind of ride down. You lean backward on the air and ride down, fast and exciting. I'm up there, having done the first half of the ride. I look down and see Dovre, my daughter, laying on her tummy asleep, on a bench. I see one big crow or raven and four of five little ones sitting on her back. As she stirs, they fly up a bit and settle down on her again. I see the big one go sit on a boy's head. I know this is magic stuff, and realize the boy has been chosen by the raven, the wise one. I call to Dovre and tell her what I see, asking if she can see it too. I say, "There's a prairie chicken in the kitchen too." I see a top-knotted African kind of bird. They all look so real. I wonder if they can be seen by others and feel a slight fear that if they are real, they could just scratch or hurt the boy and Dovre. But I do know they are "dreams" or "other world." The spirits. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A woman director, dark-haired, and famous is on TV doing her regular show. I think her name is Carol Lawrence, or something like that. Her friend Lucille Ball decides she wants to come on the show as a surprise and tease her friend. She prepares by putting on ear muffs and two square boxes, one over each ear. She wonders for a moment if she should do this. Would people think it silly or untasteful? She decides to trust her instincts. She goes on, surprising the crew, and then Carol. It ends up being a classic touching and humorous bit that people found endearing. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am sort of Yul Brynner in a swimming pool. I am also a woman who talks to Jack Benny. Then I (the woman) says or does something that touches Yul Brynner deeply. He tries to describe this insightful moment to Jack Benny. He reaches over to a lamp, which is in the swimming pool, and unplugs it (or plugs it in, I don't remember which way it goes) and then carries the lamp and begins to follow me (the woman) as I get out of the pool. He stands directly behind me, wanting contact. I become aware of him. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I have (or some woman has) created a theatre or movie set. She puts on shows there, but this upsets a man and a woman in the next room/area. It's their stuff to do that and this upstart has taken over their space. They come after her. Then it's like the same story, but it's Warren Beatty that lives in a huge castle/mansion. He's very rich. He has a jealous sister. He buys out her upper stories part of the mansion to create a theatre. He's up in the big room when a jealous boyfriend type man comes up. Warren wants to hide, but the room is empty. A trap door opens on the ceiling and a bed comes down from the hidden sky roof room. It lands on him, unfolding like an accordion. It hides him. The man tries to drag him out and beat him up. Then as though the dream repeats the story, the bed thing comes down again and hides him, only there is a beautiful spirit woman that lives up there and Warren is in love with her and wants to join her. He resists. Then his other sister and her daughter, his niece, come to the castle to see him, I think at his request. She (the niece) is now the dream ego. I/she walks into the corridor of the castle and see a huge door roll open, like in a dungeon. I peek in to its dark depths. I make fun of the image of Warren being courted by that beautiful woman spirit. I "see" her coming toward him, beckoning to him. He feels unable to resist her force. Spooky, I think, "Maybe Death is there!" I then see a huge, dark black-robed figure of death come toward me. I feel fear and start backing up. He comes gliding right after me and grabs me by the arms. He starts forcing me back toward the other wall. Maybe there's another door there. I struggle and now he's behind me dragging me down the hall. I resist, saying to him, "But I'm not ready yet. I'm too young." He laughs. He makes a joke. I poke his bony leg at the knee with a fork. Like right, that's going to help. He feels no pain. This is DEATH! He has a death grip on me and I am afraid. There is no way out; he has me. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A man, Richard Chamberlain, and I are deeply in love. Another woman is in love with him. He and she are sort of engaged. She is American Indian. He must stay with her because of the vows. It is painfully poignant when we are together, because we know we can't have each other. There is some ceremony where he is placed between two cloth partitions (sheets). He is kneeling, like in a confessional. She stands on the left side behind the sheet, and I stand on the right side, peeking out from the split in my sheet (like two curtains pulled together). He smiles at me, sadly. Then she begins to get hysterical, accusing him of being untrue and doing her wrong. As her accusations get more hysterical and untrue and harsh, the entire tribe begins to see it is wrong. They walk away from her. She is now sobbing and screaming that she had been to the doctor's this morning and got bad news. Finally she's on the floor sobbing. Everyone has left the building except me and Peter Jennings. I resolutely stand up from her fallen body and walk away, now leaving her entirely alone. I feel very sad for her and worried she will kill herself. I say to Peter after we are outdoors, "I don't know how long I can bear to stay away. I'll probably return and stay with her for a while." I see my lover walking toward me. He and I meet, and lay down together slowly on the cement stairs. He touches my cloth collar at my neck caressingly, a forbidden touch, but we must connect. I sigh and say, "I think she's dying," and then I say, "It feels so good to be near you." He says, "Yes, for me too." | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am at some resort hotel or something, a conference. I am tired and want to lay down for a nap in my room before going to town to sightsee with my brothers. I can't find my room. I walk down a row of desks like in school, to a wall where I thought there was a door. There is no door. I go down another hall and see doors and open one and go in, but find myself in an enclosed corridor that leads to the fun house kiddie attraction. I say, "What the heck," and go for the ride, thinking when I get there I'll find the exit and go to my room. The rug is like a conveyer belt and then there's a steep set of stairs that is more like a ladder. We go down. My brother Jake is there. He introduces me to a young girl (maybe 19 years old) named Casey. "Humm," I think, "maybe his new girlfriend." We arrive at the place, but it's a big auditorium where a comedy writing contest is going on and being judged. One of my scripts is in the contest. A woman is tired and wants to go to her room because the conference starts again early tomorrow. Dwight is around, but he looks like Rock Hudson and I say, "We can go to town and sightsee later." He says he doesn't really want to go; the conference is too important to waste time on that. I still want to go, later. I convince the woman to wait for the results of the contest, by saying most earnestly that if we leave, we'd only have to make Dwight bring us back really early in the morning and that wastes more time. Now the judge comes over with his sheaf of papers. A man who runs the place is crazy for me and is bothering me by insisting we get together. I keep kindly but firmly repulsing him. He is a driven guy who won't accept no. He tries to hug me and pull me away and talks to get my attention. "What is it you want?" he asks. I say, "I want to get the results (the range of points from the different judges) so I can figure out what I did wrong and get better with my writing." The judge says, "You did pretty well, really." I'm sort of a runner up. I try to write down the scores, losing the page and searching for it again. I can't find them and the man says, "Here's the code on this page. You look for this symbol and it tells you what page." I try again. As I am looking, he walks across the gym floor, bossing his employees around arrogantly. I smile at him, because even though he is obnoxious, there is something endearing about his single-minded love for me. He comes back and tries to convince me to go to his room. I laugh and say, "No, but I will give you a kiss, like a ceremony to knight you, because I can see that somewhere under all that brashness is a real human being. You have to learn to let him out so we can enjoy him." He's all over me, taking advantage and I laugh, pushing him away and say, "Oh, beknighted one, arise and be a knight." | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am at some information booth and a woman is selling her wares. It is some new age group that sounds very good and intriguing and yet I have some doubts. Maybe they are a cult that starts invading your privacy and thoughts. I look at the children's books, a special device and some other things. I keep asking questions. I decide to buy some of the items to look at them in detail later. Now They show me an apartment I could rent, in Dover. It is a small one bedroom, with two double beds like in a motel room. A man and I are interested, but again, still unsure and hesitant. I ask the fat landlady what the rent would be she says it depends, ____ on down to 500 dollars. This sounds high to me, and the place isn't all that good a shape. but now she shows us it has a living room, a dining room and several more bedrooms. It is looking more like a good deal. The bed in the back bedroom is a narrow cot like thing. I test it and it turns out to be a flimsy hammock cloth. I ask if it is a hammock. She says no, that's not the bed. The bed would be brought in later and we'd have to sign a paper saying they removed the critters. It was some kind of an insurance scam. I don't feel good about it. She then hands me a brochure on the cheap computer they offer for sale. $13.95 and it does recipes and appointments and so on. I saw some strange contrivance in the bedroom that looked like a bathroom scale taped to a woodstove chimney that was that device. I look out the back windows to check out the neighborhood. Odd looking people, fat like a cow (and looked at first like he had an udder) and so on. We're not sure this is going to be good, but we are still interesting in finding out more. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A sort of taciturn, sad or grumpy man gives me a gift. I look in the box and see some sort of leather wine pouches, of different sizes. I say oh, that will be nice. I can put them on my wheelchair for water bags. He says nothing. I look more closely and see there are small miniature things in the bag. I see 30 tiny florescent light tubes, in their boxes. and many more things. I begin to realize that this isn't a wine bag but a miniature room with furnishings. I keep opening little things and other little things are in them. This thing keeps getting more ornate and big and full of stuff. I like it very much and hope I haven't offended the man by not understanding the nature of the gift right off. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am staying at a house, perhaps my mother's house. Ellie is there as well. There are many rooms but I sleep in a tiny one twin size bed, if fact, I don't even sleep in the bed, I am uncomfortably curled up in my wheelchair and sleeping. Ellie starts to move her things to a bigger nicer room and it occurs to me I could do that too. I mention to my mother that I'd like to hire a part time helper as I can't do things for myself and would like to be comfortable. and I want to move to a nicer bigger room and sleep comfortably on a bed. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am in a house with a lot of rooms. I decide to get on my exercise machine and discover it is broken. I realize I'd been enrolled in a business college course load and haven't been going to classes. How odd it will be to have a Masters degree and yet flunk simple courses. It will look bad on my record. I don't want to take the classes. I move into the living room, which has my father's bed in it. There is a sort of V. House feeling to this place. I try to use the exercise machine there, but no luck. I go back and count the rooms, and as I look more closely, I see the rooms are quite small and square and ordinary, which is the opposite of what my dream rooms have been like in other dreams. Jake is in a bed in the back bedroom. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A chubby, flabby boy is a Buddha emperor boy and the priest comes up to him. The boy shoves his fat belly down to make a pillow for the priest, who lays his head on the belly, a sort of ritual greeting of emperor and priest. Now they raise him to sitting and drape his fat, flaccid penis over the edge of his bed and he pees. I watch, fascinated. It's such an odd shape penis and the boy is so spoiled he doesn't even use his muscles to lift himself up. It is all done for him by the priests. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Derek/Darryl and I are going to the movies together, but first we go to his house to get something. We are talking as I gather up a wallet and borrow one of his. His buddies (the homeless motley crew guys) come over to hang out while we're at the movies. I look in the bathroom mirror and see my face and sigh. I think to myself, "I'd make an OK-looking man." I feel sad because I know Derek doesn't feel attracted to me and never will. I say, "I'll shut the window" and then say, "Oh yeah, that's right. You never lock anything. I do at my place, but it's a different kind of neighborhood, tougher." He starts to disagree with me and I get annoyed and say, "But, you don't know. I was almost..." I pause, I was about to say raped. He realizes that's what I was going to say and tries to listen. Chelsea then joins us. I feel the need to pee. We three walk to the movie house. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am sort of Sally Fields as a comedian. I come out on the stage, in front of the huge, billowing curtain. I, the dream ego, is watching from the wings. I see Sally dressed in a blue sequined gown with see-through overdress and her act is taking off parts of the outfit and the outfit look keeps changing. Now I am her and I look far down at the small and distant audience. The billowing curtain nearly knocks me off stage. I keep hissing at the curtain woman to open the curtains a bit more. She finally does. I come up with a funny bit of lines where I wait until they get nervous at me not speaking and then I say, "This comedy thing is harder than I thought. Apparently you have to say witty things and then they love you...apparently not. And they have to be funny to other people too." The audience laughs, but they are also dancing and running around. They are so far away they look miniscule. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Charla and I are together in a big double bed with lots of space between us. I pick up a ring of hers and put it on, hoping she doesn't wake up and demand it back. It is an odd ring, an engagement -like look and then a long row of gold squares and another round engagement-like ring at the end of that. I see the second part is a separate ring, plastic, that just got stuck on the end. I think it's fun to pretend I have an engagement ring. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Lucy and I are going to do a show for the community college. Julie B is there. I am asking what the name of my character is and the name of Lucy's character and other details of the story. I guess we are going to rehearse it for a while and then present it. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am an extra actress. I'm just in the background being a person sitting at a cafe table. The main actors are at other tables doing the play and I am supposed to improv gestures and pretend I am talking to other people and so on for the entire play. I keep coming up with ideas on what to do and even make a few funny remarks that could have been good lines in the play. The director, a man, wants me to make what I'm doing even bigger because it is so good. He dresses as a woman and wanders across the stage pretending to be one of the cafe extras and signals me to act as if I am leaving to go to the restroom. I do so, going off stage and he says to me, "I like what you're doing; keep on and make it bigger." I nod and go back on stage. More extras are there imitating me. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I hear about a road that suddenly caught on fire. Apparently some cars with steel belted radial tires worn down to the steel were on the road, and rust spots were on the road. It was oil soaked from years of use and it caught on fire. I ask where this is, thinking it is on a coast in some exotic locale. Oh, and it is snowing there a lot, but the snow won't put out the fire. It will burn for years. I hear it is in the state of Washington. I guess I'm hearing a radio reporter interview someone. He asks if the road is closed and now no one can travel there. The man replies, "Yes, but we have the old road people can use." The reporter says, "But that one is windy and slow, right?" I see huge clumps of land mass with gaps in-between like the road will be built to cross those coastal gaps. It will make for hard, slow traveling. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Ginny and I are on a weekend trip to the coast. We are going in an elevator up to some animal exhibit where monkeys are. Two or three teenaged, or young adult men, are behind us. One young man loves me and is standing right up against me. Then he maneuvers around until he is seated on my lap and turns around to nibble sexily on my neck. It is all very enticing, but I try to ignore him and go on. He follows me. I enter the large room where the animals exhibit is. If you stand at one of three stations and the animal likes you, it will come over so you can pet it. I go and stand at one station (in the middle). There is a very cute penguin there. He likes me and cuddles and does cute tricks. I look up at the large staged area and see very large gorilla type of animals, some of which have male human-like heads. They look scary and intimidating. As I watch, I realize they are escaping and coming out towards us to cause us harm. I begin to move rapidly toward the exit. Ginny and I and the young man run downstairs and out the door. The man is insistent in his love for me. Ginny goes to a car and I follow her. She says, "I want to get away alone for a while. I'm going to take off and I'll see you later." I sort of realize she is giving me and the man time to be alone together. She goes and now the man and I have spent a day or two as lovers. But I am married and on Tuesday I leave to go home. He is desperate to keep me. He follows me and says, "I hate Tuesday. I hate Monday because it is next to Tuesday. Please don't leave me." I am very attracted to him, but insist I must go. He is much younger than I, and I have my family to return to and I can't really believe this is a good thing to do because of our age difference. He tries and tries to convince me his love is real and forever, not a youthful whim or a passing fancy or lust. I don't let myself trust that and resist. In despair he walks away from me back into the animal exhibit building. I realize he is in bad danger and I rush in to distract and I yell something which alerts him. I had put myself in danger to save him. I turn and run out, and he escapes and runs out. Again he renews his pleas. I still say no. I am walking down the road and see a pile on beautiful conch. I pick one up and want more and then see pottery plates and bowls and realize a Native American person is selling their wares here. The man follows me. He says to me, "OK, if tell you I am rich, will that convince you to stay?" I say, "No, it wouldn't." I walk away. The man says with intense emotion to the Native American man, "Oh, I so want a Porsche to stop and pick me up." He means that I am driving a Porsche and he wants me to come back and accept him. The Native American man looks at me and says to the man, "I can't see what you see in her, but if that's what you want, then fine." Now he goes up a high cliff at the ocean's edge. I climb up to follow him, fearing he will jump or something, but as I reach him and he hugs me, I am the one that falls. He rushes down to where I lay, encircled with barbed wire that is black. I have been injured. He calls the medics and the doctor says, "She'll be wrinkled and weaker or something but she'll be OK." The doctor suggests we call the police. While we wait for the police to arrive, I ask him what the doctor said. He says, "The doctor says you'll be wrinkled and this and that, but I don't care. I still love you and always will." Now it is Tuesday and he's crying and begging me that his life will be empty and sad if I leave him. I feel tremendous push-pull, but still can't quite believe or trust he is authentic and sure. This will all pass for him soon. I leave, but I go home and divorce my husband, realizing that I don't love him. Months pass and I must try and reach him. He had given me his phone and address and every conceivable number he could be reached at. (NOTE: At this point, I think I wake up and finish the dream awake.) I go to his rich parents' large home and ask for him. He isn't there, but has an apartment in the city. The father sees me and realizes I'm the woman who his son loves and wants and says things like, "Whatever will make my son be happy and alive again, I want him to have." I go to the apartment to find him. He is with a young woman his age. I am carrying a stuffed monkey with a heart in his hands. I leave it at the door and don't even knock, but the man somehow senses me and opens the door just as the elevator door across the hall is shutting. He yells at me, "No, come back, please." He runs down the stairs and is there when the elevator door opens. He begs me to return. The girl means nothing. He was trying to get on with his life without me, but it wasn't working. He would give anything to just pick me up and take me to the apartment and hold on to me forever, but he knows I must come because I want to. He says, "If only you could come knock on the door and say to me, 'My dearest one, I love you and want to marry you forever.'" He walks away from me, leaving me to decide. He returns to the apartment. I then go up, knock on the door and say that sentence. We hug and live happily ever after. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am meeting my director in a department store. I get into an elevator and it isn't working properly, missing the exact mark to stop, so he decides to fix the thing while we are on it, which makes me a bit nervous. Now we go to an area to rehearse and basically he hands me the pages for the scene and talks me through the summary of what happens. Then I need to go to the bathroom and find one and pee. Now it is almost time for my scene. I feel a bit insecure because I might lose the lines. I have a few seconds of almost a panic feeling and then calm down and go. I am playing a silly director and wear a green beret and a butch short haircut, with pretty-colored gray and black hair like Mirabelle. I ham it up, making funny faces and following my director, who is also acting a part around the set because I realize we've never worked the blocking. Now the audience gets very vocal and noisy until we have to stop. I look out at them and they are fighting amongst themselves. We wait for a while, watching. They are seated like in a church balcony, and a bunch in the back, mostly men are standing and pushing and shoving and yelling. Then I see way up at the top, three or four rows of the young girls in communion dresses all leaving. Now they calm down a bit and I say to my director, "I'm going to go get my script because we've really had no rehearsal or blocking," and he agrees. I rush backstage to find the pages and am looking through a pile on a bed, couch thing. Another more veteran actress is saying something and I say, "You must help me find my script first because I'm on now. It's in a white folder." She agrees and I find the pages, feeling a bit bad about not being prepared, but OK because It wasn't my fault and we'll get through this OK. I go back on stage, looking at my director to help me know where to restart the scene. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A man is standing and holds a baby by its hands as it is trying to stand up. I watch and the baby is a kitten and it scampers around. I want to play with it. I see it go under a chair and see that a much smaller kitten is in there. It's about the size of a mouse. I am worried that the bigger kitten will hurt it or eat it, and I crawl under to distract the bigger kitten. I play with it and rub its cute, fat little tummy. It likes that and leaves the smaller kitten alone. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I take two male roommates to help with expenses. They put a sign over the door saying something like The Boys of Love or something. They see two young women they are interested in moving their furniture out in the hall and run out to ask if they are leaving the building. The women say no, they are moving to an apartment upstairs because it is cheaper. The boys are relieved. Now we go back into my apartment, which we are remodeling. They have taken up the carpet and rolled it up and put it in the hall. I see the floor and wonder if I made a mistake because the floor is very ugly and I will have to re-carpet the place, which will be expensive. Now I am showing the place to Paulina and Clarice (Paulina's daughter). I point out there are five different areas that represent five different characters. I see lots of early American wood stuff and decide I don't like that style. I see a picture of a woman in black and white and remember showing the same picture to Clarice when it was in full color. It is a large wall portrait of a woman standing. I go back out of this end area. Paulina says, "Here at least it looks like you," meaning the furniture and accessories are mine. I smile and say yes. Now I see Millie talking to another young woman relative. She then looks at a wood carved statue of several people in a canoe and I am explaining how sad the one woman figure is. She can't seem to see it. I try several times to point it out to her. Naomi asks something. I say, "Oh, yes, books all over, but this section the books aren't mine. They belong to one of the characters. I can't even find a book on those shelves I care to read." | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Susie S and I are walking along a road talking. I am feeling a bit defensive and hurt as she is saying we have a problem because I begrudged her two hours of work that she felt I still owed her. I say, "No, wait. Begrudged? I don't begrudge you those two hours." I feel a bit dishonest because I do feel I gave her what was required. I try to speak honestly. I say, "It's the sarcasm. I don't deal well with sarcasm, and I thought I had done the work well and gave you all that was required, so I felt hurt." She says, "Then you'd be willing to meet me tomorrow morning to talk this all out?" I think to myself, "I hope not too early," then I say, "Yes, of course. I just don't do well with sarcasm and feeling attacked. I admire and respect you and your work and if you feel I shorted you in hours, I will give you the hours." She seems to understand and says she's sorry she was sarcastic; it is a bad habit of hers. We continue to work it on out. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I come to a family reunion. I am in a hotel room and I get up. The two young girls are playing very noisily so I can't sleep. I am looking for my hair and tooth brush but I realize I haven't packed them. How annoying. Well, I'll borrow my mother's. I see a pile of books I did pack. There's a Georgette Heyer book and many others some from my youth. I want to curl up and read them all, but there is no time. I will never have time to just read them, all the ones I like. Oh well. Now I go into the bathroom where the two girls are playing, being noisy and using other people's stuff. I tell them to stop it and find something to brush my teeth with. Now I return to my room and see the maid is there making up my bed, putting new sheets on it. She's a slovenly dressed, plump lady who sort of lays down as he works. I notice she has waxed the floor and it is slippery and there are thick iodine red or that Benodine stuff they use at the hospital, red puddles on the floor. I slip and slide my way precariously out the door. Now I have to get down the very steep (like a ladder) stairs without slipping and falling. I hold on hard to the wood post on the banister and carefully walk down. Then I start going faster and start skipping steps, and finally at the end step on a couch and hop over some things and jump the last flight of stairs and land unhurt on the ground floor. I see someone, a woman, watching me and I see I left some slipper marks on a step or two and the back of the couch. I am kind of surprised I didn't hurt myself on that last jump. So now I get to the room where the reunion is happening. I see Patricia and her husband Morton, and music is playing and people are in Halloween costumes except me. I didn't choose to wear a costume. Now I am dancing with Patricia's husband and I don't know the steps because it is a country dance, but he wraps his legs strongly with mine and I follow his lead very well. At the end of the dance he is surprised when I say I've never danced this kind of dance before. He is impressed. I go to find the relatives I like. As I walk through the room, I see Grandma Mildred there and am surprised because she's been dead for years. She looks years younger and rejuvenated. She is still an older woman, but she has cleavage and somewhat pretty breasts, long pretty hair and is in a sexy white negligee gown thing. Millie comes over and says, "Hey, I only want to talk to the ones I find interesting or that I like," meaning her mom and me. My mother is nearby, watching. Grandma is chatting and Millie wants to talk real and important things. I wander off and a band is being set up to entertain us and I say to the organizing woman, "Let me do a few things while the band is setting up." She at first is reluctant because usually my stuff has been boring or repetitive. I tell her, "I won't do the old stuff, like Evangeline; I'll do a new comedy routine and a dance number I learned." She hesitates, but since I agreed to do it while the band is setting up, it's OK, so I go out into the center of the room. The benches (like church pews) are placed in a theatre in the round style, but some of the benches face away from me. I start talking a comedy routine and at first it's pretty deadly quiet in terms of laughs. As I continue and build, they start becoming more interested and laughing until I have their attention and they enjoy my routine, which is improv and just me talking. Now I am going to dance and I call for my partner. Now the point of view shifts and I am in the audience watching this beautiful flighty woman and her partner dance. I am sitting on the floor in the gentle arms of some man. Now the male dance partner comes over and comedically opens his cape to reveal boxer shorts over tights. He wiggles his hips and the shorts fall down around his ankles, only there's another pair there and he repeats this two more times. The man I'm with gets a bit worried as this is a family audience and the children are there. Then the male dancer grabs his crotch and makes an obscene gesture. I am uncomfortable, but hoping everyone sees it's for comedic effect. Now the woman dancer with wonderful, curly long hair begins to dance and she steps on the back of a bench and twirls and dances around the room. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Rochelle is in a room, perhaps with other lesbian women also. I am lying on the back of a black leather couch, joking or being playful. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A man, who is short and almost doesn't have any legs, in a wheelchair, likes me a lot. There is also a woman like Tracey with very shortened legs in a wheelchair around. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A man is bending over something and looking at it, and behind him rises up a huge whale, like peeking over a rim of rocks. Its mouth is crooked like a cartoon shark mouth. The man looks back over his shoulder and says, "Ah, The Clan of The Cave Bear." | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Leighanne, a man, and another woman and I have ordered some food from Taco Time. We get our order but it is all wrong. Who ordered the Enchilada, or the chicken nuggets and the burritos came with everything and so on. I ask the others if they are willing to accept the order. I see a few things I would be willing to eat and from lack of interest, we all decide to keep, or rather a decision is never actually made. We just didn't do anything about it. I am looking for the chicken nuggets, but the pretty woman ate them. She is wearing a beige, lacy, sexy dress and I wonder if the overdress is mine, but it's just her shawl. She is like Jessica Lange in "Blue Sky," very sexy. She is wondering where the costume department is. She goes off looking and I try to pack up the food stuff and my shoes and this and that. Then, John (a fellow teacher) is a black man and he is doing funny impersonations. He's doing one where he must walk backwards in front of a person (also a black man) who is walking toward him and as he does this, he is talking like he is threatening this person, like he has the power. This is very funny and he says it only is funny when he walks backwards at the same time he is trying to sound threatening. Then the black man asks him to do another impersonation. He does a famous important man, maybe Martin Luther King. He is very good and he is also still walking backwards as they go into the Theatre Department building. Now I go into a classroom and John is there, only now he looks like Robert Young, in "The Second Woman," about a man who might be paranoid and dangerous, but the woman loves him. A black man comes in and John and he are having an argument that is at an impasse. John teaches class on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 1:00 to 2:30 and the "Makeup Man" wants that room at that time. Neither is willing to budge. I take the role of fascinator or mediator. I write on a blackboard the headings "Makeup Man" in a purple/pink chalk, and on the right side of the board, I write "Instructor." We are going to list all the objections until we can come to some compromise. I notice the Instructor space is larger and more convenient to get to and say, "Oh, oh. I am not being fair. I'm already biased." I go to another board and try to make it equal. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am lying on a couch, burning a candle and watching it burn. It goes out and I try to relight it, but now there are two, no, three, no, four wicks. I light them and one or two go out and I relight them. Now they are all burning and as I hold the candle in my hands, it is now a square of wax and melting very quickly in a strong line down the middle. I realize it will melt through and it does, breaking into two pieces. I ineptly say, "Oh, Oh, Oh," as the hot wax splashes out over the coffee table and on the carpeted floor. Just then, as I am up and grabbing a towel to clean up the mess, I notice the front door is slowly opening. I go to the door, afraid and try to close it, but two teen boys, one very blonde and has mild CP, are in the room and I know they intend to rape or hurt me. I say, "No, no, no," in an inept way and open the door for them to go out. I try to insist, but they laugh and I manage to get them out and shut the door and lock it. I know they are going around to the back door. I go to the phone and dial the whole number for the police department and wonder why I didn't just dial 911. I give my name, Barb Sanders, and my address, 795 W. Street, #302, E City. I say, "These teens are breaking in and I'm afraid they will hurt me, and I need someone to come and check it out, just in case." The police don't seem too interested in helping me. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Charla is deliberately refusing to obey me. She is running down the stone steps of a huge Catholic church. I am very, very angry at her and crying and upset. I cry out to her, "You must stop. Come here at once," and so on and she laughs at me and keeps on going. I know somehow that to keep chasing after her and pleading in anger isn't going to work and I should withdraw, but I am driven by my strong feelings to continue. It's as though I can't stop. Jake comes up the steps and I see he is going into a room that has religious statues and I hope he will at least nod his head toward them in respect, although he won't do the Catholic thing, seeing as he isn't Catholic. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am on some deserted island place, and I see a brown, strong naked woman run past me. I follow her to a pool. It is a ritual bathing place. I and some other person with me go into the pool, not knowing what we are supposed to do or why we are supposed to do it. There is a recessed shallow spot off the deep larger pool and I/we are in it. I look out and see the pool is deep and empty. The water is very clear. But I sense danger around. I see a huge crocodile swim past me, its tail braided. I am not sure if it is merely an animal crocodile, or if it is an intelligent life form. It crawls out on land and signs in as Captain Morg. I stay in my shallow area afraid to go out into the larger pool. Now a car drives out onto the water, does a turn and drives back. These people aren't afraid. Then a person walks across the water to the hallway on the other side. I look into the hallway and see a group of people walking toward the pool and an exit sign glowing at the far end of the hallway. I feel stupid and cowardly hanging back in my little recessed area as these other people matter-of-factly go about their business. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am walking along and see a child movie star. She will play the lead in a children's movie. Now I go into a large room set up with backless benches and a few chairs for children to watch the movie. I sit on one of the chairs because the benches would give me a backache. But the chair keeps sliding backward. I pull it back to where it should be and it slides again. I can't seem to stop it. I wonder why I am wasting my time watching this movie which is either Wizard of Oz or Cinderella, when I could be watching one of my taped movies. The screen is far away and is a white bed sheet. I won't be able to see well. I think I'm there because I'm curious and drawn to the fact that there is an "important" person there, namely the famous child movie star, even though I am not particularly interested in her or her movie. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I seem to be the prison warden. The men are surly and dangerous. I have to stop something and I use fast karate blows. I am damn good at it and beat my foe. Another powerful inmate is watching me closely, looking for his opportunity. I then go to the infirmary for the doctor to bind up my wounds, but he is also my fiance and he rejects me, I think because he doesn't want me doing this dangerous job. I am hurt, but bravely go on. I return, exhausted and emotionally drained, to my office and find a young woman and a Hispanic man trying to make out on the floor by my door. I tell her to be in my office at 3 o'clock and I'll teach her about birth control and then I decide the man better be there too. This was yet another betrayal and I am angry and self-righteous, and yet I'm trying to be doing the right thing for these people too. I enter, but it isn't my office; it is a courtroom. I interrogate the prisoner who is on trial, the man I beat up, and the other powerful man is secretly sending him signals by scraping the legs of his chair against the floor when he should not answer. I realize this is a code even though it is subtle. I am on the alert. [BL] | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am a member of a woman's club. The president of the club and another woman get into a scandal thing with one woman supposedly moving in on the other's husband. There are two teen boys as well that kind of do the same kind of thing, one taking something the other has. Now the president doesn't come to meetings. I guess she is ashamed. Time passes, and at a meeting I watch as the two women start talking it all through and now the whole thing is understood and accepted and behind them. The president resumes her duties. Now I am at a woman's house. I am admiring a special tree where she has grafted different fruits on it. There are grapes and cantaloupes and bananas on it. I am very impressed. How neat to grow your own fresh fruit, all on one convenient tree. I look at a series of glass tubes with liquid stuff bubbling around in them. I ask some questions. These tubes are the special acid/ph factor balance stuff for this special tree. Now I am eating a cantaloupe from the tree, only as much as I say, Ummm, how tasty," it really isn't. I keep scraping out these masses of black seeds, like watermelon seeds. It never seems to end. The bites are stringy and pulpy. I finally realize this isn't good fruit. Now I go inside to help the woman decide to leave her husband. She hasn't opened her mind to what misery she is really experiencing in the relationship. Now she sees it. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am at a Family Reunion, the Sanders side, I think, lots of cousins and small children and babies. Some of the small children are very active and noisy and as much as I love being around them; it is hard. Now I am sitting behind Aunt Abigail and somebody talking to someone, maybe my father. I watch as Francis P hides behind a door and watches as Delilah comes in to ask if Francis got a present. I laugh and whisper to my father, "Isn't that something, how he sent his wife in to ask for something?" Abigail turns around and I peer closely at her bright hazel eyes. They are intense and quite pretty, with many golden flecks of color. I laugh, a bit uncomfortably, feeling caught. I say, "You sure are pissed at me." She says, "You don't like them, do you." They are too rowdy for you. I feel embarrassed and try to fix things with a bit of a white lie. I say, "Well, that's true, we aren't the same kind of people, but that doesn't mean I can't enjoy them the one day of the year we see each other. I thought it was kind of cute." This mollifies my Aunt and I am relieved, for she was as intense as a mother bear protecting her cubs. The reunion goes on and now I am watching my father's montage TV screen, a special machine to create a montage of past events. He had already edited the reunion footage and added a narrator's voice, his own voice, to it. I see myself in a pretty dress, low bodice and a small waist. I look good. I am wearing a pretty wide brim hat and posing with smiles. Then I am playing a silly role of a very fat or pregnant woman in the same dress. Then I am riding one of the small horses, not Ginger. I am riding the brown one and I see myself from the back end as the horse trots and then playfully gallops. I ride her through a sprinkler. It is fun and we stop to soak up the cool water. A pinto horse is named Ginger. The noisy child that is hard to be around likes the horses. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am seated on a couch and Leroy, my cousin, comes over and sits near me to kiss me goodbye. He and his wife are going home. I love him and I feel he loves me. We lightly hug, as his wife is standing there watching, almost in slow motion, I lean up and our lips are close together. We steal a soft, loving kiss in a way that the wife can't see. Now he goes home. I find some reason to go there. The wife is very suspicious of us and we are very careful, but we are indeed in love and take every stolen moment we can to brush up against each other or look into each other's eyes. This is a difficult life we are moving toward, a suspicious wife, we don't want to hurt her. They have been in a good relationship for years, but our feelings are too strong and we can't resist. Apparently I was in a play, because Leroy says to his friend, "Tell her you liked the play." He comes over and says, "Yes, Grandmother, I loved your play." He was very polite. He and I talk about how special and alive one feels on stage. Even if you are not alive and ordinary off stage, you can always go back on stage and recapture that special alive feeling. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I think I had been traveling in Europe and have returned. I am now on a country road, looking for a small town I used to live in. I pass the town and end up in some other small town. I stop at a house and a woman says she will walk with me for a ways until I get my directions. I say, "I think I'm looking for L City or A City." We come over a rise and look down into the valley and see farmlands and a spire on a university brick building. I say, "We are in Mo City, the Western (state) State University." Some woman asks me the name of the main hall. I say, "I can't remember." I remember the one for L. and I remember the one for another university. It is a very pretty scene. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Lucy and I and some others are about to take an important test, like for a masters degree or something. A woman is lecturing about something Lucy didn't understand. I realize I could answer it well, and this woman isn't. She is meandering and missing the point. I choose to keep quiet and let her do her thing. It's time to fill out forms to take the test. I have papers with me with addresses and so on in case I need them. I can't seem to fill out the form. All the places where it looks like I should fill things in seem to be only for people who are applying for grants or entering a contest. I am confused. I then find the right place and start to enter my name and university name. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A small girl is in danger. I am trying to protect her. A male gangster has a gun and henchmen and is trying to poison or take the little girl. The girl is very afraid. I see a box delivered to her and in it is a bottle like Fiberall and she's afraid of it. She is lying in the box with plastic inserts like ears next to her head. She looks terrified. I take her out and hear the gangster coming and tell her to go into the bathroom and hide. She does. The gangster has a gun on me and I have a gun on him and we threaten each other. It's a standoff. I feel great hatred for him. He's mean and persistent, but somehow he's not really trying to be a bad guy. We keep up the threatening stuff at each other. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I spent the day looking around and exploring a huge mall or market place, which feels like the Internet. A man and I become acquainted and we informally wander around together. That night I go home to my father's house, where I live. The man and I are discussing about maybe getting together again tomorrow and seeing something that we both are interested in, but there's an interruption. I go into my bathroom and notice the bathtub faucet is leaking. I turn it closed and give it one last turn for good measure, to help conserve water, but this starts a drip and then a stream of water from the shower, which is perpendicular to the bath tub. It can't be fixed by adjusting the knobs and now a lot of small jets of water are spraying out over the bathroom. I leave to go find my father in the living room to tell him to fix it or get a plumber. I walk at a fast trot for what seems like miles and finally reach the living room. I am amazed how big the house is. It's not very convenient. I remind myself to get everyone in the family's phone extension numbers. Next time I'll call. I find my father seated in a small coal bucket-like thing with two kids. He's reading them a story and I call to him, but he can't seem to hear me. I try several times and finally he looks up. I tell him about the problem, and we start walking back quickly to my bathroom. It is a long journey. I realize I'd left that poor man up in the air about tomorrow and wonder if he'll come back. I feel bad. We arrive to find the man in the bathroom and he's fixed the problem. He put in a few washers and some small plastic cups to shield the faucet in case it does it again. I thank him and he says, "It's nothing," but does manage to mention it cost him 20 dollars for the plastic things, but he needed some himself, so it's OK. I want to pay him back and I am unclear if this is my father's expense, as it's his house, or if it's mine, because I am an adult and I live here. I want to pay for it myself. I try to introduce the man to my mother but can't remember his name and apologize, making a small joke about no brain cells left after a long day at the mall. I remember his name is Martin. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am a woman who is interviewing for a job. A man named Will is across the desk from me. He looks like Liam Neeson in Nell. I tell him I was fired and there was sexual harassment and so on. He asks me if he's the first person I've interviewed with. I say dryly, "No indeed. As you probably guessed, I have had lots of interviews but no one will take a chance on me. They think, like I think you are thinking now, that it will happen to them. I will accuse them of sexual harassment, like I'm the perpetrator, not the victim." He looks sympathetic. Then I see a scene happening in the next room down the hall. A beautiful woman is distraught. She is resisting going into a room and she calls out "Bear, Bear," which seems to be a name of a small child who disappeared or was hurt. She is sobbing. I see a mask that a child drew on the wall. I also see a written report that says "Domestic Violence." Now Will leaves the room and I wait for his answer. As I wait, a small odd-looking man, like a leprechaun in a business suit, walks conspicuously through the room calling my attention to him, nonverbally. I watch as he leaves the room by a side door and then I look out the window as he sneaks back around to the next door and sneaks back into the hall. "Humm," I think, "he needed me to be a witness to his leaving. There's something fishy going on here." Will returns and is kind to me. He shows me a glass figurine of a horse which belonged to the other woman. I hold it on my arm and look closely. At first it is a glass figurine of a shoe, an elf or ancient woman's shoe, then it is a horse on spindly glass triangle legs. The legs break off and I am trying to reattach them. I notice there are shoes on the ends of the horse's legs like the shoe the entire figurine was at the beginning. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I go into a church and I find Derek lying on a leather chaise lounge kind of couch. He is staring contemplatively at two or three paintings set up on easels. They look like his dream pictures. I walk past, greeting him and put something away and then come back. I look at the first picture and see a horse. Then as I look at other details I am struck with how dynamic this picture is. As I shift field of vision, different depths become active, vital and to the forefront of my awareness. The middle ground becomes illuminated and I look at it, and then I am drawn into the background, which happens to be horses raining from the sky, and mountains. I turn to Derek and tell him what I saw and how amazing this sifting of perspective is. I like the picture very much. I sit next to him as we talk. He is silent and contemplative. He adjusts his position to make room for me near him. I reach for something across his chest as I am talking, which places me in a sort of hug position across his body. As I do this, he touches my hair tenderly and says very softly, "Will you....marry me?" I hear the "Will you" and guess that the words are marry me, although I do not actually hear them. I say, "I can't hear you. What did you say?" He touches my hair and I can't tell if it is just a casual caress or a real sign of affection. I want it to be, but I don't want to respond as if it is unless I know it is, so I won't scare him and embarrass me. I touch his hair in a caressing manner. The feelings are very confused and mostly I feel ambiguous and he is ambiguous. It is tender and I like it. Then he gets up and moves several of my file cabinets for me. I guess I'm moving my office to this area. He is helping me place things. I examine the placement and say, "Would you mind if these two cabinets (which were mine) are first in line with the others (from a previous office owner)?" "No problem." We move them. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am trying to teach a class about subtle communication stuff like nonverbal behavior. I am talking about small eye movements and so on when I see they have left, maybe a recess or they are restless or something. They come back in and I continue to try and teach. The man teacher who had been distant is now trying to help me. We end up burning a pile of garbage and cardboard. Somehow this is a together, helping thing. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am in a hospital getting blood, or giving it, with maybe a surgery coming up. I am in a hospital corridor looking for the elevator. A woman comes up and introduces herself. Apparently I know her. She asks me if I will go see Santa Claus. I say, "Oh, maybe." I look down over the railing at the Santa surrounded by kids. He smiles up at me in an inviting way. I then start to go around the corner to find the stairs. Howard comes up and asks to borrow my glasses. I give my second pair. I am now wearing a Santa suit, a round ball for a fat belly. The jacket is open. I am walking down the stairs and kids look at me. I close the jacket. I go around the corner and find the line for Santa. Howard comes back up after the Santa thing. I need some glasses and he offers his to me. I laugh, saying, "I'll try but I won't be able to see anything," since his prescription is worse than mine. I look at them before I put them on and am surprised to see they are one huge lens, not two. I put them on and can see just fine. I tell him I like his better, because mine are trifocals and hard to see out of. A man watches, friendly like. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am sitting on a couch cushion that sits beside the couch. The problem is, the couch is in a large body of water. It is getting soaked through and beginning to sink. I am aware there may be danger in the water, sharks, perhaps. I go to dry land. There is possible war there as well. Now I am going to go to an informal audition. I had shrugged it off at first, not particularity interested in home grown theatrics, but decide to participate, feeling like this is a cinch, I can do this in my sleep. I decide to change clothes. I go into another room where Deirdre, my cousin is. I ask to borrow some clothes. I choose some pink sweater and a skirt. I look at it and realize that it looks a bit tacky and ordinary when I had thought the outfit would look slinky and good. I'm a bit disappointed, but can't see anything better. I wander back slowly, getting distracted. I am a bit arrogant and uppity. Other people are all excited and enthusiastic about the play coming up. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A Native American man is nearby. I am working hard, resenting the work and feeling overwhelmed. I am doing the dishes and trying to organize piles of papers. He says to me lovingly, "I'll do the dishes for you. It's all right." I feel guilty and relieved. He assures me it is no problem. He would love to help me. I uneasily let him. I now try to straighten the papers. He says he will do that too. I then start to dance around in a circle, slowly at first and then with more pep and fun. I like the dance. So does a small dog, maybe a Terrier, who leaps into my arms on one of my dramatic twirls. It looks so cute and the Native American watches lovingly, happy to see me happy. I do it again, with the dog, just to feel the endearing smile of the man. Now I see another man, actually a suit of clothes all folded up, only a thin, ill man is in it. I pick him up gently and hold him. I have great empathy for him and his pain. I smile tenderly and say, "I understand how hard it is and how beautiful it is when you can reach that moment when you can love the pain and yourself. It is a rare moment and hard to get to. But it is ecstatic when you get there." | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I apparently now live in a very large house, but only use a couple of the rooms. My cousin says to me, "Perhaps you will take in Deirdre. She could live with you." I feel the woman's need to better the situation of her child. I look into the bright green eyes of the child (perhaps middle school or early high school age). I say, smiling, "I'd love to have a child with green eyes and green hair." It is really blonde hair but she has a huge green hair ribbon on. Those eyes are an illuminous bright green, a very unusual color for eyes. She is happy. I tell her she has to fit into the routine and get up at this hour and do this and that and then we'll all get along well. I think it will be more work, with the baby I already have, but it will be OK. I wonder if she will go to W. High School. Now the scene shifts and I am talking to the principal, a tall, large man. I am investigating what seems to be a racial discrimination situation. I am a journalist in attitude. At first the principal is hostile and defensive. I guess he thinks I am accusing him. I keep interviewing people and the focus shifts bigger and bigger until the principal says, "Ah, I see. You are now looking at Universal Peace, not just a discrimination thing for one person." He relaxes and is helpful. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Lucy and I are together. I realize I've been skipping classes again and will get yet another term's worth of failing grades and "Y"'s or incompletes. I feel like a failure. Lucy asks me if I've talked with Dr. Roy. I then start drinking out of a small baby bottle; I am sucking water. I kind of feel some satisfaction reverting to baby, but a woman disapproves very much, at me, a grown woman behaving like a baby. I feel a bit guilty. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am in a house. Charla is being naughty and noisy and I tell her she has to take a nap. I pick her up and put her on the bed and she wriggles around. I give her a small swat on the butt and say she has to stay there and I'll know if she sneaks out. I leave the room. Several women are there in the house and they are uppity, high class women who disapprove of Charla's behaviors, and they disapprove of me. They follow me around being snotty. Now I am in an acting class and they are in the same class. Everyone looks down at me and laughs openly at me. I take it in stride, not getting angry. I am a bit frustrated, but I laugh at them being so silly. They hate that. I tell them quite bluntly and firmly I don't like their attitudes and behaviors. I am matter of fact. They get very angry at me and are vengeful. The man I am to act with takes on their attitude and is sneering at me. I look up at his face, all deformed with a glass milky white eye. I say to him, "You are very ugly." He lunges at me, supposedly acting and I side step and move away. A woman comes near me and I jump, like I'm going to defend myself from her physically. I have a pair of scissors in my hand I hold like a weapon. I feel a bit embarrassed because she isn't attacking me. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Now I am in a very ritzy house. The kittens, three of them, and a puppy, all want out and I go to open the door. They had been cooped up in the house too long and need to pee. But as soon as they get out the door on the porch, they want back in. I won't let them back in. Now more uppity rich women come to the door and tell me Mrs. Baxter wants to talk to me. Then they leave. I smile and agree to visit Mrs. Baxter, even though I know they all hate me and it cost them dearly to even speak to me. I now walk down the sidewalk and am in awe of all the very rich houses, very colorful. I gawk like a tourist. I can't find Mrs. Baxter and keep walking. I ask a woman does she know where Mrs. B. lives and the woman says yes she does. I then ask if she will tell me. She thinks, smiles and says no, she won't. I hear a group of women, who have been following me, laughing at me. I know this is a stupid joke they are pulling on me, but again I am not angry, but choosing to do what I want to do, which is see these beautiful homes. I come to the end of the land and see the beautiful vast sea. It's a resort area. I'm on a promontory point and I look down and see huge mansions and the ocean beyond. I look back to my left and see people sliding and playing in a frothy surf waterfall kind of thing. When I look down, I feel dizzy and vertigo. The woman are laughing very loudly and applauding my "stupidity." I walk back toward the house, still deliberately ignoring the women and seeing the sights. I see one house where a woman sits on a blue couch and chair set outside of her house. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am sobbing. My heart is broken. Derek has betrayed our relationship with another woman. Now he follows me around begging me to forgive him. I can't stop crying. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Derek is with someone else or is ignoring me. I am sitting next to his brother and decide to hell with Derek, I will chase after his brother. We hug and flirt. Derek is jealous and moves between us. Now I'm having dinner with Derek and then a helicopter comes and picks me up in the middle of the dinner. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | It is Victorian times. I am one of four sisters who are having trouble getting a marriage partner. I find myself walking up a mountain road to a resort that is for people to meet future mates. The driveways are unfinished and only partially paved. There is rough dirt and gravel. I wonder why I chose such a low class (middle class) place to go to. I feel a bit embarrassed and ashamed I have to do this. I see the name of the hotel on the porch. Something Bachelor Beau____. I look again trying to commit the name to memory. The word "sin" is there followed by a goose and a gander, wooden carved thing. I chuckle at the reference to the sexes. I enter the main living room. I see several older gray-haired gentlemen and my heart sinks. A blind man, more my age, says to me cynically, "Are you here to get a rich husband?" I say, "No I am not." A door opens and several other men come in, one couple obviously gay. They are dressed in modern clothes. I am in a full length satin Victorian dress. I think to myself, "I would like this to be Victorian and I don't want the gay couple there." I am taken upstairs by a plumb maid. I don't want to be here. Now one of my sisters is here. We are both trying to get a husband, only we kept this secret from each other and both choose to be at this hotel. She is annoyed to find me there. We are to go down to dinner. We barely speak. At the dinner table is a sinister, black-haired typical villain of romance novels. He wants me. I despise him. He sits next to Lydia at the opposite end of the table. I now leave the dinner and go out for a stroll. He follows me and presses his suit. I am repelled and faint. He picks me up and carries me back to the hotel. My hero, William Shattner, is coming up the drive and sees me being carried by the villain. He, William, says, "What's this?" I am taken into a room to be examined by a doctor, but my spirit stays in the waiting/living room seated on a couch with the villain seated on my right. William gets on bended knee and is trying to hold my hand. I try to resist, but tenderly keep my hand in his. He leans forward to kiss me. I permit it without returning the kiss and then my feelings overtake me and I kiss him. He now knows I love him. I say to him, "I (meaning the sleeping me in the other room) won't remember this." William says, "But I will," meaning he will continue to pursue me, knowing now there is a chance. The villain's lips twitch. He is very unhappy. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am back with Howard. He is sweet and caring and young. So am I (young). We have a baby and Howard is the main caretaker. He brings the baby to me. The baby has short, stubby legs with thick thighs. I look at his feet and say, "Oh he will grow up tall and strong. He has big feet." Then the baby gets up and walks around a bit. I am amazed. He is a newborn. Then he begins to talk. He tells me he has listened in to my thoughts. He is gentle, loving and an alien baby of some sort. I am very impressed and we bond. He is helping me. He gives me advice. I realize Howard and I haven't been sleeping together and having sex for years. I want to start that part of our relationship, willingly and with joy. Now there's a crowd of people and I am dressed very pretty. I've lost weight and another woman, a movie star, is trying to take the attention of the crowd. With the baby's telepathic support, I step into the center and charmingly take the admiration of the crowd, mostly the men. There is a bunch of FBI bodyguard type men there. Howard and the baby and I are going somewhere. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am going to lie down in this square, empty field on a sleeping bag. Some members of the C. department are there setting up an electronic surveillance device around the square. They ask if I can see if the one near me that stops things coming from the corn field seems to be working. I say it is. Something approaches the other side from the street and at the curb is detected and stopped. I think I am holding a dolly. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am watching a TV show. A woman is interviewing Dana Carvey who is totally goofy and lies and makes a fool of her constantly. I notice he has taken my wallet and I am furious. I demand it back. He laughs at me and continues teasing me. I begin to dump out his pockets and so on, making a terrible mess. I am furious and self-righteous. He begins to like me and continues teasing me. I bolt from the place, now naked and stoned or drunk. I cross the freeway, not even looking to see if I'll get hit by the cars. I go down a bike path near the river. Dana jumps in the river and swims to try and follow me. I go into some restaurant and see a woman who is the manager. I remember I tried to be a manager once and didn't do a good job of it. This woman with exposed breasts is doing a fine job. Dana is there, loving me. I ignore him. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I sit in a cave-like place and look for baby frogs, but only see adult ones. A small child is there with me. He catches a frog and I pick off pieces of its flesh and feed the other frogs with it. I realize what I'm doing and stop, a bit disgusted. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am in Russia. traveling. A mountain blows up, fire comes out of its frozen sides. I go to investigate. Multi-colored blobs of lava come out and fire sprays up. It's a volcano and it is melting the ice cap. The water is rising very quickly. I decide I need a boat. I conjure up one and row. The entire world is now nearly underwater. The water is smooth but deep. I row up to Moscow. The buildings will soon be covered with water. There isn't anybody or anything around as the water covers the earth. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I and another woman are entering a big auditorium. We want to get good seats so we can see the events on the stage and meet in the back with our small group easily. It will be very crowded soon, we know, because we went through this before. I go to the left rear side and get a folding chair and then decide to go to the right rear side as that's where the small group will meet, but the athletic team has reserved most of the seats in the back and so I change my mind again and go to the left rear side to find all the places are almost taken and finally decide on the aisle. The ceremonies are starting and I lean way over to see. It is Rosalie, the Mayor of E City doing a discussion or speech and she's written "Rosalie" on the blackboard. It's just one word, her own name. I laugh and share this with a woman next to me. Then a male actor comes in and waits his moment. As he gets up to take a leather bag up the aisle shouting his lines, I realize the fingers of my left hand are caught in the straps and I am running up the aisle behind him, desperately trying to get my fingers out. I am wearing a bridal gown and veil. I finally get unstuck and go back and sit down. I tell the woman how embarrassed I am, how conspicuous I was. [BL] | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Charla is lying on a bed, she's perhaps been overstimulated, maybe by me, or maybe by Ellie. She (Charla) suddenly goes into a grand mal seizure. She vomits and starts to choke on it. I feel horror. I am waiting passively for Ellie to do CPR. I want Ellie to do it and am aware that I should do it, but it would be messy and stinky, so I don't. Then Charla dies. I am grief-stricken and sob and feel terrible guilt for not taking action quickly, which could have saved her life. It's a terrible nightmare. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am watching as a disembodied observer. I see an old lady on a motorcycle. She refuses to put hub caps on her back wheels. She wants the spokes exposed. She wears leather and is feisty and independent. However, she decides she wants a job. She offers to be a delivery person for messages. She is hired, but as she takes the leather message pouch and lays it on the back wheel, the employer insists she cover the spokes with a hub cap. It annoys her a bit, but she complies because she thinks the job will be fun and she can see the sense of it. After all, it would not be safe to let the bag get caught up in the spokes when she's driving. So she takes the pouch with the papers inside to her destination. When she gets there, there are forms to fill out and she has lots of difficulty getting this done. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I and a man are together in a hot air balloon. We are traveling over a mountain. We are very close, but trouble starts. The balloon rope starts to fall or disintegrate. I try to hold on to it. We drift over to the west toward the ocean and barely make it, now landing safely on the beach. How very nice - we can camp here. We land. I see a restroom right in front of the spot we decide to rest at. How convenient, but will it block our view of the beautiful ocean? I look over around to the right sand we can see the ocean, calm but also coming right up to our edge of the camp. I think to myself, "Sure hope this is already high tide or that the calm conditions keep up or we'll not be safe here." We decide to stay. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am at a house, possibly my "mom's" house, and a combination party is happening. One group of people is my relatives and another group is my disabled friends. I go from one room to another, mingling and chatting. In the relative room, my mother, who is fairly young and pretty, and I tap dance together. Everybody likes that. We have fun. Then I go to the room with my disabled friends and we talk. Rochelle questions me critically. I made a statement and she'd say, "Did you actually use the masculine pronoun?" I just looked at her and said, "Yes, I did" (not politically correct, you know). Now a woman is going up on stage to sing a song with a big name rock band. I am her sister or friend and am asked to come on up and join in. So now there are four to six men from the rock group, "Heads and Roses," mostly drummers, and her and me. She sings and I add some harmony. The song is about "I love you Dad." Dad (not my real one) is out in the audience. Even though she is the star, I manage to get the last line in with excellent harmony and everyone is pleased. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A baby kitten is being cute and is crawling up my pants leg. I am laughing and try to peel it off. I notice then that its claws are long and in deep and it is somewhat painful, but I finally get its claws off me. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am at some office building, maybe the newspaper. I meet Mark H and a man and we are talking. They show me a newspaper clipping from years ago about me and all the good works I am doing in the disabled community. Mark is gentle and sweet but somewhat distant. I tell him congratulations for getting the handicapped coordinator job at the community college and tell him I used to be that. I tell him he can call on me any time if he needs help or has questions. I do that to leave an opening so we could get together, if he wanted. Now I am at home. Mark and his sister and his cat come to visit. We all chat. Mark is shy, but seems to like me. I like him too. I hold his cat and the cat is loving and cuddles gently in my arms. It's as though I am holding him (Mark). This is a good sign. This means the cat, who is fussy, likes me a lot. This is important to Mark and his sister. Now they are leaving and I walk them out to the porch. Only now Mark is seated, semi laying down on a porch seat. I sit down near him and we talk. I look past him and see a huge river with lots of people playing and swimming. He asks me to describe the scene to him. I tell him it is a pleasant Sunday afternoon where people are all out to enjoy the wonderful weather and have fun. I tell him about four fat men who each stand ten feet apart and at a signal all fall in backwards into the river; the kids swimming and playing. A sled that looks like a snow sleigh goes by, with red painted trim. I describe that. A convertible car with no engine or hood in the front goes by, crawling over the couches near the bank. The driver is concerned that water is splashing into the empty place where the engine would be. He wants his spiffy car to stay spiffy. I say to him, "I'm sorry," thinking I helped splash some water. Then I say to Mark, "I'm always telling people I'm sorry." Mark and I are getting physically closer, our arms brushing each other. It is gentle and loving and shy. We are very attracted to each other. Mark tells me of his house, which is his but it's his mother's and his family is very important to him. Then I notice the river level is dropping. All of a sudden, the entire water contents of the river drain away and everyone falls to the bottom, including us. A man tells us that the water will be gone for one or two hours. I look up and see the man on a high balcony by a metal railing. The sun is warm and bright. I am looking up at him but aware I am shyly avoiding looking into Mark's eyes. I have Mark, a quad, folded up in my arms and I stand up and start walking, carrying him. The way is rough, stones, debris and boulders. It makes walking hard, but I am managing well. I get back up near the house and Mark says, "My brother left a taped message in your van for you." I laugh and say, "Then let's go hear it." We go back toward the van. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Charla is not minding and I am angry and I am slapping her across the face and hitting her. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Jake and I are traveling together. We stop at a motel. Jake is going to a conference. Some weird old lady who runs the motel chats with us. He looks at his brochure. Jake is very happy about the low cost and the great fun things he'll get to do at his conference. I seem to be along for the ride. The old lady shows us to our room and as she is still there. Several other people sort of wander through. A man on a bicycle cart that has video taped movies on it backs into the room. I go over and look for a good movie to watch. It would be fun to rent one, but they all seem to be boring or old titles and I can't find any I would be willing to watch. I say to Jake maybe he'd want to watch one of the old sci-fi ones. Jake says no. I notice he has blank write-in books there and say, "Oh, I have plenty." He leaves. Several other people come in through another door like they'd just come downstairs. Now the lady says something about the river in the back. I want to see the view. I go to the window and look out. I think I see the river and then I see it is just the highway. I look across the highway and finally see a pretty waterfall further down on the right. Then I realize the river is right in front of me, across the highway. I feel a bit foolish at not seeing it right away. Now the old lady wants to show me something and we see an odd elevator that has build in cubby holes where books and so on are kept like in display in a store. It goes up, so that a series of these displays are run past me. I see some ink pens and she says I can choose one. I try a couple of them and find one that writes in thick black strokes. I like that one a lot. I choose a pretty blue one and then she offers that I can have one of each color. I take the purple one also. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | There are wild mustang horses and I and some man are catching them and riding them. They have cartoon-looking eyes and each one has a sign held up or somehow on their faces below their eyes. The signs are pieces of large white paper with words on them. Now we are doing a documentary on the Wild West or cattle drives or something. We interview cowboys and then three Indians come by and I approach them to ask for an interview. I say, "I know we whites took your land and you have no trust of me, but I'd like to hear what you have to say." One takes an interest in me (I am a young, pretty woman with long black hair), He agrees to talk. Now the other man I'm with is the owner of a cattle herd and ranch and is doing a cattle drive. I decide at the last moment to tag along to help. I grab a horse, a blanket with a space blanket inside and some beef jerky kinds of food and gallop after them. This infuriates the man who chooses to ignore me or help me. If I freeze or starve, then fine. I follow along doggedly. At the ranch house, his mother says to me, "Make him talk to you. Then maybe he'll stop being so cruel and stupid." I laugh and say, "If I could, I would." He is adamant. Some other woman wants to help me and finds four umbrellas and ties them to my saddle bags. I say, "How will these help me? I'll take them if you can convince me they will be helpful." The woman tries to think of a way they can be helpful and says they would make paper sounds when opened and this may scare the cattle into moving, or scare away predators. I am not convinced. I ride out of the house to catch up with the man on the cattle drive. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am seated on the right end of a couch. I feel tired. I notice a cobweb right in front of me with two spiders on it, which gives me the creeps. I inch my way over to the left side and start to get up. I say something and a man seated at a table just to the left is furious and angry with me. He tirades on about how filthy and lazy I am. A woman sits to his left at the table, and I look first at the man and then at the woman in shock at this tremendous outburst. I turn to my "father" also at the table and I say, "Does he mean I don't bathe often enough and I stink, or does he mean I don't change my clothes often enough?" My "father," who is a stocky short man with thick dark hair and tired bags under his eyes, gets up and walks to me and kneels in front of me. (He looks like an older, tired Deepak Chopra.) He says, "I love being around you best when you..." and he gestures with his hand like he is wiping away tears. I'm not crying, but I do feel put upon and sad. Emotional, at any rate. Then he puts his head on my knees, rather than in my lap, and I have to reach a long ways to smoothe and caress his hair, which I do. I say, "I just don't understand." He says, "Ira Nah-nah," and looks at me knowingly, like I should get it. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am in a church community room and a group of church members are there. I have led them to believe that I am dying and they are having a ceremony for me. It is their tradition to gather in a semi-circle around the injured or dying person. Each member offers a gift and connects with the one who is dying in very touching, loving ways. The woman explaining uses the following example: "If a dying person wants to be treated like a queen, then someone might bring them a robe and drape it over them and bow and treat them like a queen." So, first the group stands in the front of the room and sings "Oh, Come all Ye Faithful." I stand in front of them, singing with them. I am deeply moved and near tears as I sing with them. The song is beautiful and I haven't sung for a long time, what with my throat difficulties. I am feeling very guilty for accepting all this outpouring of love on false pretenses, since I am not dying. Ellie is there sitting to my left. She looks at me, knowing I am cheating. [BL] | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am up all night with some people. I am tired. Ellie calls me up. She's had some premonition about me dying. Possibly Aunt Millie is around and we talk about it. Then a man friend named Richard comes over. He is heartbroken. He's in love with a woman who won't have him. I am supportive. Richard goes to see his Doctor and I go with him. It is 3:00 am and as Richard talks to the good-looking doctor (like Deepak Chopra in looks), people come to the door, one at a time and hand him handwritten notes. He pauses, reads them, smiles appreciatively at them and continues with Richard. One of those people is a young, frail teenage runaway girl. She has a crush on him. He is gentle with her. The doctor now asks me out for a dinner date. I smile and say yes. I like him and he likes me. The next night I come to his office. I am dressed in a sexy black dress. I am young and good-looking with a trim, firm figure, and I am wearing a coat, like a trench coat, over it. I want to dazzle him later with the surprise of how nice I look. He says, "The car is over here." I look and see a tiny black sports car. It is very spiffy, but as we get to it, it is filled with rusty brown water. The top is down and perhaps it rained. I don't really care one way or the other. He is watching for my reaction. Then he says he has another car and opens a garage-like door. It is up a few feet (maybe 4 or 5 feet) from the ground level and covered with a car protection tarp. He unties the tarp and removes it and the car goes backwards like down a ramp and stops next to me. It is a plain brown station wagon. I cheerfully open the passenger side door and see three plants with red flowers on the floor on the passenger side and some cardboard boxes. While I am chatting with the doctor, I move the cardboard boxes to the back seat, asking his permission first, to clear a space for me to sit. He seems pleased that I take all this in pleasant nonchalance. Now he's driving and I am seated to his right and slowly we inch closer together. I'm still in my coat. Now we are close. I say, "I used to live in cities but I don't like cities. I love small towns." He agrees. He loves small towns also. He says, "There's hardly any more places left on earth that don't have a road coming to them." I turn my face toward him and his face is so close, I kiss his cheek tenderly. He smiles lovingly. We arrive somewhere and discover that my friend Richard has been arrested by some military man. Richard had fallen madly in love with another woman who is no good for him. I want to rescue Richard, so I approach the military officer and take my coat off slowly. The doctor is behind me so as I slowly drop my coat, the military man sees the front and the doctor sees the back. They are both mesmerized by my beauty. I have sufficiently distracted the military man and Richard runs for the small row boat. The doctor and I follow and the three of us shove out into this huge lake. I notice the tip of a brown creature's nose peeking out of the waves and feel a second of concern that it is a monster. We continue on. It is a bit difficult as the small boat bobbles in the waves. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | I am afraid of this young boy, young teen, maybe 12. He is going to hurt people, me included. I run from him, trying to block his route behind me. I am now in a house, with some other people -- a woman, a girl child and a nice man. I call the police. The boy is systematically eliminating each person. I dial 911 and calmly, but scared, tell them my name and address and this boy is killing everyone and he's after me. They must come at once. He's eliminated the woman, then the girl, and now he's got the man. I am still on the phone saying, "If you don't come now, it will be too late." He turns off the TV and is approaching me. I bolt for the door, even though I know my best chance is to stay in the house until the police get there, but now it seems my only chance is to get away from him. I run. I am now at a lake or river with murky water. I am in the water and there is a fence to my left, dividing the water. I grab it with my hand. It is an electric fence and sharp jags of electricity play on it and jolt me. Then I (the dreamer) decide that no one would put an electrified fence over water. It would be too dangerous. I see the raft the boy made. It is a single log, tied at both ends with rope and the two other ends of the ropes are tied together at a docking like of thing. This makes a triangular shape of the log and the ropes. He yells at me angrily, "No girl can touch my boat." He comes for me. He dives into the murky water and I use the log as a pole to keep him from me, and then as he bites my toe, attempting to bite it off, I use the pole to beat at him, trying to kill him before he gets me. I am afraid. He's got me and is gnawing through my toe. The pain is excruciating. I am screaming, "Help, Help!" to get the police to know this is where I am. Then I scream V, so they know it's me, the one who made the emergency 911 call. I wake up. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | A young man, sort of an older version of the young boy of the previous dream, is desperate to connect with me. He follows me and does whatever he can to be with me. This is dangerous to me. I feel bad for him and keep trying to get away. He pursues. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | The same young man finally commits suicide rather than continue to put me into danger from his desperate need. Since he can't stop himself, he must kill himself. | female | 1960-1997 |
b | Barb Sanders | Sharon L is teaching me to play a saxophone. At first I am terrible, with squeaks and noises, but with constant practice, I become very good. I am a man and on a stage. The audience is sparse and not too interested, but as I practice, the audience gets bigger and more interested. I decide to do a comedy act with the sax. The stage is very high. I see a paper with an article about 5th and 6th grade students and how as an audience they are disdainful and rude. They wander around and ignore and make noises talking among themselves. By now I am quite good and the audience is thick and attentive but very far away, and the stage is so very high. Now I have an orchestra of sorts with maybe five violins. I decide to expand and play the blues fiddle as well. I see Curtis Salgodo in the crowd and ask him to join me onstage playing the cello. We improvise. The music is very good. I'm thinking of learning the blues harp as well. Now the audience is also on the stage in raised seating behind me. I have only a narrow strip of stage to work on. I nearly fall off the front of the stage and get a dizzy sense of vertigo whenever I get close to the edge of the stage. I'm playing well and the audience is attentive, but distant. | female | 1960-1997 |