Cinematic dreams
Jul. 30th, 2012 07:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
altivoEvery once in a while, I have a memorable dream involving cinematic scenery and/or dialog. Early yesterday morning, one of these arrived for no apparent reason. The odd thing about this is that (as many of you know) I'm not a movie or television fan at all. I rarely go to movie theatres, never watch television, and have little interest in those aspects of popular culture. Regardless of all that, yesterday I dreamed.
The setting involved a largish house, where I was visiting friends (no idea who they were, though.) The house seems to have been a mixture of at least three different houses I remember. One was a run down farmhouse where I rented the first floor with a friend my senior year of college. The second seems to have been a largish "summer house" owned by a college friend's family, located a short distance from Lake Michigan in Onekama Township. I visited there perhaps twice. The third is the house Gary and I owned in the Ravenswood neighborhood of Chicago (quite likely the only one still standing of the three, though it has been severely "remodeled" by subsequent owners.) The high-ceilinged living room with windows on two sides clearly came from the old farmhouse and our Chicago house. The white painted exterior with many windows came from the old farmhouse plus the Onekama "cottage" (as they called it, but it was huge.) The exterior landscape, where the real action took place was all Onekama. (And I haven't thought about that place for probably near 40 years.)
Anyway, I went out in early morning to walk in the woods. It's a hilly district, consisting I think largely of sand dunes from an ancient lakeshore that has been reclaimed by trees, scrub grass, and other vegetation. It was either early spring or late autumn, I'm not sure which, but there was little foliage. Still, the undergrowth was dense enough that you couldn't see much through it. Walking the edge of the woods, observing the yellowed greens of the grass and the gray of a pre-dawn sky (I know, how did I see the colors in dim light? No answer, but I did.) I came upon a river shore. (No river in the area of Onekama that I recall, but anyway.) It wasn't large, but looked swift enough to discourage any effort to wade across.
At that point I noticed movement or sounds in the undergrowth on my side of the river. Looking around, I couldn't find anything, but I moved cautiously back toward the house. As I did that, a large tawny-brown animal came out of the trees and went toward the river to drink. It lowered its head while I squinted at it in the dim light, trying to tell what it was. At first I thought cow or bison. It seemed quite shaggy and had high shoulders, which is what suggested a bison. (There are of course no bison in Michigan other than those in zoos or other captive settings.)
The light was improving by now, with the sun due to rise behind me at any moment. At this point the creature turned toward me, about a hundred yards from where I stood, and I realized that it was a large male lion. (No Aslan comments please. There was nothing "religious" about this dream.)
I began to feel real concern, but was sure I should not turn and run. It merely stood and watched me as I carefully backed away down a gentle slope until we could no longer see each other. Then I could move perpendicular to my original path, back toward the house and without being seen. I didn't get far, though, before I heard deliberate heavy steps through the grass and leaves on the far side of the little rise. I decided I had better peek but before I could do so, the lion's head appeared over the hill, somewhat behind my present location. I froze, he froze, and we stared at each other. Just when I was sure he would charge me, he turned away instead. Taking off at high speed, as if afraid of me, the big cat ran to the river, leapt across it in one bound, and vanished into the trees on the opposite bank.
At this point I woke up. It was about 4:30 am, and the grass and foliage in this summer drought does resemble the faded colors of the dream. Our creek, however, is dry now, and nowhere near as large as the river in my dream even at spring flood.
I cannot venture any guess as to the meaning of this, but it was certainly visually striking, and had no words to it whatsoever. The sounds, such as they were, remained very subdued. No birds, no wind, no water. Only the rustling of leaves and branches, and the sound of footsteps.
The setting involved a largish house, where I was visiting friends (no idea who they were, though.) The house seems to have been a mixture of at least three different houses I remember. One was a run down farmhouse where I rented the first floor with a friend my senior year of college. The second seems to have been a largish "summer house" owned by a college friend's family, located a short distance from Lake Michigan in Onekama Township. I visited there perhaps twice. The third is the house Gary and I owned in the Ravenswood neighborhood of Chicago (quite likely the only one still standing of the three, though it has been severely "remodeled" by subsequent owners.) The high-ceilinged living room with windows on two sides clearly came from the old farmhouse and our Chicago house. The white painted exterior with many windows came from the old farmhouse plus the Onekama "cottage" (as they called it, but it was huge.) The exterior landscape, where the real action took place was all Onekama. (And I haven't thought about that place for probably near 40 years.)
Anyway, I went out in early morning to walk in the woods. It's a hilly district, consisting I think largely of sand dunes from an ancient lakeshore that has been reclaimed by trees, scrub grass, and other vegetation. It was either early spring or late autumn, I'm not sure which, but there was little foliage. Still, the undergrowth was dense enough that you couldn't see much through it. Walking the edge of the woods, observing the yellowed greens of the grass and the gray of a pre-dawn sky (I know, how did I see the colors in dim light? No answer, but I did.) I came upon a river shore. (No river in the area of Onekama that I recall, but anyway.) It wasn't large, but looked swift enough to discourage any effort to wade across.
At that point I noticed movement or sounds in the undergrowth on my side of the river. Looking around, I couldn't find anything, but I moved cautiously back toward the house. As I did that, a large tawny-brown animal came out of the trees and went toward the river to drink. It lowered its head while I squinted at it in the dim light, trying to tell what it was. At first I thought cow or bison. It seemed quite shaggy and had high shoulders, which is what suggested a bison. (There are of course no bison in Michigan other than those in zoos or other captive settings.)
The light was improving by now, with the sun due to rise behind me at any moment. At this point the creature turned toward me, about a hundred yards from where I stood, and I realized that it was a large male lion. (No Aslan comments please. There was nothing "religious" about this dream.)
I began to feel real concern, but was sure I should not turn and run. It merely stood and watched me as I carefully backed away down a gentle slope until we could no longer see each other. Then I could move perpendicular to my original path, back toward the house and without being seen. I didn't get far, though, before I heard deliberate heavy steps through the grass and leaves on the far side of the little rise. I decided I had better peek but before I could do so, the lion's head appeared over the hill, somewhat behind my present location. I froze, he froze, and we stared at each other. Just when I was sure he would charge me, he turned away instead. Taking off at high speed, as if afraid of me, the big cat ran to the river, leapt across it in one bound, and vanished into the trees on the opposite bank.
At this point I woke up. It was about 4:30 am, and the grass and foliage in this summer drought does resemble the faded colors of the dream. Our creek, however, is dry now, and nowhere near as large as the river in my dream even at spring flood.
I cannot venture any guess as to the meaning of this, but it was certainly visually striking, and had no words to it whatsoever. The sounds, such as they were, remained very subdued. No birds, no wind, no water. Only the rustling of leaves and branches, and the sound of footsteps.
