As I head along the motorway my dog is tagging along behind halfheartedly. He is so far away he has become little more than a black dot in the distance. I have to believe in this relationship and that he will return without my insisting that he sticks by me at all times. So I walk on, miles ahead. Will he follow like a good sheepdog? Have I made a mistake? I so want to see him again.
I am in a public building - maybe a community arts place - trying to get my old drawings into some kind of order. In the kitchen antique crockery is piled on the dark shelves. There has been an attempt to place everything neatly but there are too many things and so the overall sense is of chaos.
.
A tall black guy was organising some kind of cycle event but has since abandoned it. I am determined to do it so I seek him out. He is working at his regular job as a gardener in a large private house. He tells me how he had a road accident and has been nervous about getting back on the roads. "Come with me," I say , "I'll look after you."
I need to leave. I've got so much to do. A TV presenter dressed in yellow is delivering a talk on organising your self and your home. I am interested - I need it - but she comes in with sheaves of untidily written notes and she's so young that I can't trust anything she says. She starts to lose peoples' interest, and two young women, either high on drugs or with mental problems, are charging around the room jumping up on the chairs. "I'm waiting!" she threatens like a school ma'am very ineffectually. All the time I am thinking - I have to go, I've got other things to do...
The comedy actress Jessica Stevenson is a visual artist in this dream. She has made a small black lacquered folding box with I think gold or brass hinges. There is something painted inside. It's a bit like a Chinese puzzle box only not quite so complex. I really want her to like me, but I don't quite get what her work is about and she sees that and so has little time for me.
Three dog owners - one of them Sporty Spice - take their untrained dogs for a walk on Streatham Common. Sporty Spice lets hers off the leash and he dashes down a foxhole dragging out ten snails. He then heads down another hole and fishes out a freshly killed plucked bird with pale spots on its skin.
(What's with all these dogs??!)
A police officer recalls a nocturnal police raid where a golden Labrador police dog charged into the bushes in search of the criminal. The dog returned after a "snap!" was heard. In its mouth was the severed head of a black Labrador. The P.O. says he will never forget it and swings a long wire around at ankle level to catch the criminal.
Keep on getting things happening around the ankles in my dreams...
It is the end of a conference in a large European city. I am with redhaired Alma and a large friendly man. I am keen to say goodbye to blonde Alma with whom I have spent a lot of time. She tells me I have some red hot issues to deal with here because I am still in love with X. She gives me a book of short stories she has written - one is particularly relevant. I return to the others."Look Blonde Alma gave me her book," I say. "Or did you write it?" I ask Red Alma. The man laughs - "I wrote it!" "But it has to be written by a woman and its all about Alma - look at the bit about Alma pudding! and all that stuff about her young lover!" "So happy you liked it," he says.(had completely forgotten I had any knowledge at all of Alma pudding but there it is in Mrs Beeton's cookbook)
I am in bed with a skinny man who reminds me a little of Steve Coogan. I had thought there was going to be a real meeting of minds and bodies but realise very soon that is not the case: he is so awkward that his head is on upside down. His teeth seem somehow back to front, the front top row short with pronounced incisors. He tells jokes incessantly. I wonder how I am going to get away from him.
I have been working in this Elisabethan garage for a few weeks and have produced a book of dreams. Outside on the ground I find what appears to be an old fossil which turns out to have some kind of SS connection.
An image of lots of small cards, each depicting one small fraction of a part of the body. One pile when assembled in three dimensions forms an arm , another pile a leg. I understand that each card represents one dream and that all the cards will eventually make a whole body.
Some ghastly competition for the best band is taking place - something like Pop Idol with its waspish producers. We watch overworked kids full of hope - some angelic voices and crazy dance routines. Seems to be set somewhere in East Europe - everything a tad rough round the edges. At one point I make a suggestion about everyone getting together to create one group. But I know no-one is going to listen to that.
A woman walks down a country lane. She is wearing something reminiscent of a Chinese tunic. An almost invisible vertical line is drawn through the middle of her whole body. Her left and right side mirror each other although you can scarcely tell. Her face looks odd because each side is a reflection of the other.
A small crisp bag with the symbol of an eye on the outside and a silver coating within, is seen running along on wheels. It is empty but open as if waiting for something to be placed inside.
I live on the top floor of a big squat. I have persuaded a young woman to pose for me and the small drawings I have made I place in a small container, like a Japanese poetry box. After a group of people enter the room I fall asleep and later wake to find three are sitting round a table smoking dope. A light is on downstairs illuminating everything on the floor through the cracks between the floorboards.
An early crude cartoon - centuries old - maybe something from Lincoln Cathedral. Or perhaps an ancient drawing of a lion or a dog.
Everyone receives a document to be completed for every dream. Within this paper are spaces where the dreamer is asked to supply extra information - with particular emphasis on colour - even though the final drawings will be in grey tones.
I look across the busy road at a man in a gorilla outfit jumping over a two storey building. Some awestruck teenagers run over the viaduct to join me. Now a gang of overdressed girls clamber over the house fearlessly. They are all dressed colourfully. "Hey you girls are dressed like Bratz!" I say. "Yeh we love them!" they answer enthusiastically. I secretly think they look a bit ridiculous but I like them and tell them they look great.
Military planes fly in formation above a field just outside the town. As part of a "friendly fire " exercise they begin to drop bombs - the idea being to see how much damage will be wrought by such a bomb attack. In a built-up area the damage would be devastating. Now a plane load of refugees from Poland arrive, about 60 or 70 of them, led by a grandmother and her grandchild. I am moved to tears by these proud stoical people as they are reunited with relatives. There are so many more we have left behind.
Oggy, a young terrier, is charging about on a busy main road. I run after him and see him disappear under two lorries. I manage to stop the traffic and he dives into a local school pursued by little kids. Stepping over a ground covered with scorpion fossils, I finally catch him and now he seems even younger, he has no teeth. He is so hungry, desperate to eat anything. I should probably return him but I have a strong feeling I want to keep him.
In amongst a pile of dead leaves I see a small crown formed from teeth about 4 inches across. Industrial wasteland in the background.
One huge yellow ring springs off the London Eye into the Thames. From a flat on the opposite side of the river Ra's sister (although she is not) and I clutch hands and watch with horror. People leap off in an attempt to save themselves. I am shouting "Jump jump!" although they can't hear me. As the construction (it is made up of concentric circles so looks nothing like the actual Eye) collapses further, there are electric sparks. The people are carried away by the now fast flowing water. I know this was always going to happen. It was such a crazy thing to build it by the water.This was such an extraordinary dream I think I have to write a little about it. I had the dream on the last night at the conference for Dreams and Culture in Lincoln and was fortunate to be able to tell it to a group there.It was a very frightening dream and left me quite troubled. Recently I have been feeling positive and happy, convinced that connecting to my dreamlife is a way of building some kind of inner strength and that it is something our society needs to embrace. A real way of learning more about who we are.One of the main thoughts going through my mind following this terrifying dream was a questioning of this whole business of looking into my dream life. Had it got too intense? Is it, as one man had suggested, like opening a can of worms? Should it all be left well alone?I really wanted to understand this dream. I am convinced we can use dreams to help us, and that when the dream is so urgent then we need to heed it. There were two psychoanalysts running the group workshop. They used what is known as the Montagu-Ullman technique, which does not aim to interpret the dream, more asks the other members of the group to imagine the dream was their own and to PROJECT their own feelings and understanding of the dream back to the dreamer. So treating it like a story if you like. I won't go into everything that came up as the session lasted for an hour and a half . Just to say firstly that it was the most amazing experience and I walked out on cloud nine. The group suggested meanings within the dream. Some didn't seem quite right but the majority clicked and I was able to see the dream clearly and realise the extraordinary complexity within it. To give a couple of examples: one person recognised from the start the double meaning of the "Eye" and "I". This had completely missed me, but immediately it was said I realised of course yes that feels right. "Ra" is actually the name of a good friend of mine, but someone suggested that there is also an EGYPTIAN SUNGOD by the name of Ra and could that have any significance?! It felt right again- so weird - I know very little about the sungod but have read something about him in my past. And the yellow rings somehow seemed to tie in with that. And the sun is a symbol for the self. These are not just academic notes but things that felt emotionally right.The "London I" now made a bit more sense. I had this dream on the night of the day I was returning to my home in London after having been away in Ireland for two and a bit months. I was anxious about returning. I feel I have learnt so much from a concentrated time there exploring my and other peoples' dreams that I was scared about returning to my old humdrum life in the city. One person suggested that because the woman I was with in the dream was someone I scarcely knew I was getting very little support in the face of this tragedy happening before me. She suggested that's what I needed - more support in London. And that just really hit home. I had so much wonderful support in Carrick in Ireland whereas in London my friends are all dotted about and we see each other too seldom.There was a lot more to it. But suffice to say I felt something lift and was invigorated by the whole thing. So I will heed this dream. I want to set up a regular dream group in London as a starter. So if you are interested let me know.
I meet a young man who I am attracted to. We have bonded well but he seems a bit unsure of me. On his bare back is a list of all his past lovers arranged in a grid in red and black lettering. Numbers 1 to 3 are vague . One woman's name appears at number 4- "May", then "husband to..." At numbers 6 to 7 or is it 7 to 8 the word SCHICKSTER is emblazoned twice. I know this name is special. A line is drawn under each and a space left at the bottom at 9.The word "schickster" I know is made up of "trickster" and the german "Schicksal" (=fate).
Jamie Guest and I are looking at a dream hovering about one foot above the ground.
Wonderful dreams tonight - more journeys to exotic places. We pass through a shop/museum showing a collection of intriguing artefacts from around the world. Mum loves it and wants to stay longer. At the end I see two beautiful men with cats' ears, dressed in cat suits. They are young and nimble and carry a large drawing board.
(The men make me think of the amazing artist /tightrope walker Phillipe Petit.)
Travelling along a mountainous road I am now about to turn a corner. I am at the end of a stage of work. There are celebrations. I look back at art I produced years ago scarcely remembering any of it. Was any of it really mine?(I have been in Carrick for just over two months working on my dream diary and collecting other peoples' dreams. Tomorrow I leave for a conference on dreams in Lincoln.)
We are creating an installation of diagrams with a group of kids aimed at exposing the cynical new development along the Shannon. Everyone is working flat out, copying biblical texts onto a map of the river dotted with names from the London underground. Big circles demarcate the deadly preaching zones where the new developers are planning to strike.
A fresh faced Blue Peter presenter is being asked on camera to dish the dirt on everyone she has ever worked with. The filming takes place at a distance and each person she describes is seen leaving the space. Growing increasingly uneasy she is probed about her latest co-presenter. The camera zooms in to close up and we see her tired and emotional, her eyes brimming with tears. "That's enough," she says, "You are manipulating me. I don't want you to use this footage." Davina McCall and the crew are sorry she is not going to continue but know they have a gem of a programme particularly the end part where she breaks down.
I bake some leeks in a cheese sauce with fish or ham. It all looks delicious. When I start to eat it I realise I forgot to wash the leeks. They were organic and are gritty with sand.
Two arrogant twins, who shift between sexes and racial background, have just attended a conference but shown no interest in it. They had been allowed in purely as observers - we were wrong to push them towards something that was unsuitable but recognise that they fit another unforeseen role perfectly. The ease with which their new function materialises is compared to drawing a street lamp lighting the branches of a tree, where all the twigs unexpectedly arrange themselves in concentric patterns.
