I am pregnant with two men's baby. (dream)

DREAM

I go to the doctor with a group of people. The nurse comes out and says to me, "Congratulations, you are pregnant! These two gentlemen are the fathers."

I look over at my two friends, and I feel no anxiety about having their children. They're older, mature, caring, and stable. 

"The egg split into three parts: one part for each of them, and one part salmon." 

"One part salmon?"

"Human-hybrids are rare, but they can live long, healthy lives." 

I go back outside with my friends, and I observe my belly throughout the day. It's not very big. I would think that a fish-human baby would be quite large. I wonder if I really am pregnant.

Then I remind myself that a medical professional not only said I'm pregnant, she pinpointed the fathers. I have to be pregnant.

I wonder what kind of a future my baby will have after I see what a seal-human hybrid looks like. It just looks like a seal. But I have to assume that it has the mind and heart of a human trapped in a seal's body. It can't socialize with other humans. It can't work together with other humans. It can't marry. It's all alone. And its human parents go on an ice floe and feed it fish every now and then. It seems like.a sad, lonely existence.

That's not the kind of life I want for my child.

I imagine what my child will look like. I'm sure it's not just going to be a plain old fish. Then I imagine it will have a really creepy, alien-like upper body and a large, fishy lower body. And it will have to live in the water. I feel sick. 

INTERPRETATION

I think this reflects the worries I would have if I were to have children. Is this the kind of world in which the child would thrive? What if it was born with some unusual proclivities, like a genetic predisposition towards drug addiction, or what if it was born with a frail, neurotic temperament? Where is the infrastructure necessary to having a happy life in our time? There are such few jobs and houses. If I can't somewhat guarantee that the child won't have a miserable life, why have kids?

A violent dream about a simple life. (dream)

THE DREAM

Patrick Stewart is running away from a shop owner chasing him with a machine gun. He falls, and some money flutters to the ground. He saves his life by reciting some lines from a Superman TV show, which the gunman loves. Hearing Sir Patrick recite them is soothing to the gunman, and he's entranced. 

I pick up the money and duck into an outdoor dress shop to escape some approaching gangsters. 

I make small talk with the girl inside the tent-like structure. She's one of two workers (it's a family business). Her father is with another customer.

She takes my measurements.

I say, "The big girls one should work fine," referring to a very tiny dress that's being advertised on the wall for larger women. It's stretchy and ruffly and looks like something a small child would wear to a tap dance recital. 

"Can I pick this up?" I ask the girl, meaning later.

She becomes someone else who looks a little like a young Liza Minnelli, and a weird smile creeps onto her face. She nods. She seems to trust me, even though I haven't paid, but do I trust her with a face like that? 

I need to get out because I can see and hear some gangsters shopping next door. 

I go a little further away to a taco stand where my friends are. Someone complains that they are out of avocados.

"Steve hates not having guac at his Taco Bell," remarks one of my companions.

"What is an avocado?" asks someone else.

I say, it's that, then I point to some layered green food a man is holding that only looks like avocado. Actually, it's more closely related to a cucumber or a zucchini when I take a closer look. 

Then I see another man come up to the stand while eating 5 huge layers of avocado at once. The original avocado was two or three times larger than his head!



THE INTERPRETATION

I think this is pretty straight-forward. I've been dreaming about Star Trek, and I think it's just a reminder than my Paramount+ subscription is expiring and I don't have much longer to binge Picard.

I've also been thinking about taking a dance class, but I hesitate due, in part, to concerns about my weight. And I just had a conversation about Liza Minnelli.   

The dream takes place in California, and all of the neighborhoods I go into are Mexican, which is probably just my brain trying to process my daily Rosetta Stone Spanish routine. I get really excited about the possibility of picking out words in Spanish while I'm out and about around town, like I was trying to pick out words in the conversations of the gangsters in the stores next to me. So far, I've understood bits of conversations about someone's dog, and someone's food at a local barbecue. I wish I knew more, but the lessons are starting to get rough.

My coins get stolen at an outdoor, international fair! (dream)

DREAM

I am house sitting. I want money, but I see how one girl is getting it and I don't like it. I watch from overhead. She's going to see a boyfriend in the city. She's a bubbly teenager or young adult and she drives to his house. 

I know he doesn't care about her from her description of him, but when I see him, I'm surprised there is a crumb of care. But only a crumb. She's clinging to it.

She unpacks her intimate things. 

Her dad genuinely cares for her and gives her a bunch of coins the next day to go to a fair. I teleport into the scene and ask him for money too, and he lets me select from the same handful of coins. I am very surprised I don't have to do anything foolish or dramatic in order to get money from him. I don't have to do something dramatic like take on a boyfriend who obviously doesn't care about me. I pick the biggest coins. I look at them and they're worth $7 Canadian. I'm considering where I can exchange these coins when I'm interrupted by a musical number. 

My dad wanted me to learn about these people who are outdoors, singing. I look at a brochure. They're Irish--my family's kind of Irish. So I'm surprised their musical is a mix of French and Spanish, mostly. And they're painted and dressed blue and yellow. 

A strange man comes up to me after the song and dance number while I'm considering where to exchange my coins, and places a hand over my money. He hovers over it and when he pops up again, assures me he didn't take any. However, I check my pile when he's done, and I see that my biggest coins are all gone. He seemed so honest and friendly, but he's stealing from me!

I hate that he's done this. I just don't know what to do about being cheated! How am I going to get my money back? Then a friend interrupts my train of thought.

INTERPRETATION

There's a reason why I've been feeling extra salty lately. I'd tell you, but I practically promised someone important to me that I wouldn't ruminate about it anymore. The dream describes the situation really well though: I felt as though someone stole from or otherwise violated me, and I don't know how to approach the situation! 

Also, the dream describes how I really need to be making some more money, and I'm getting a little desperate, so I was thinking of doing some kind of service job. But in my experience, those jobs are usually really, really bad. Lots of drama, exploitation, and chicanery. I must believe, somewhere in my subconscious, that there must be a way for me to make a living that doesn't involve doing something horrible. 

I'm learning some Spanish and Swedish with a subscription to Rosetta Stone, and I've been thinking of adding some French lessons, so that explains the language of the musical and the costume done in the colors of the Swedish flag. 

Making a list. Checking it twice. In the summer. (dream)

DREAM

I'm putting together a list of words that start with "cr." I don't think I can do it, or I'm at least very nervous that I won't be able to do it. But I keep coming up with words that start with "cr," and when I double-check the list, all the words do start with "cr." 

The list is correct. But I'm having a hard time believing it's right. 

INTERPRETATION

I don't think I've always been this way, but for the past several years, it seems like I keep thinking I can't do the things I want to do. But it's not true! 

If someone persists, it's likely that they'll succeed--at least in some fashion. Things don't often happen the way we expect, but I think that something good usually comes out of hard work. 

Walking through the cold woods to find a lost message. (dream)

 DREAM #1

I'm in college, and I'm here because I was inspired by a somewhat famous influencer who works in tech. But I've just heard that he's been cancelled, and I feel terrible for him. I don't know if the allegations are true or not, but I have some of his writings that I think might clear up what I think about his character. The problem is, I don't know where I put the writings! They were handwritten on little crumpled scraps of paper.

I go through the wet, green woods looking for any trace of where these scraps of paper might be. I find little post-it sized notes here and there, unaffected by the mushy, mossy forest floor. 

INTERPRETATION #1

I guess a piece of me is afraid that my career pivot will end up being unpopular in the eyes of other people. I am really working on putting up an emotional shield in which I only let in the things I choose instead of automatically absorbing the emotions of the people around me, but it's very challenging for me. I really envy the people who don't at all care what people think. I definitely think I care less about what people think than I used to, but I do still care too much too often.  

DREAM #2

I'm in the shower and I'm using up the very last of my sugar scrub scalp shampoo. 

INTERPRETATION #2

I was on vacation when I had that dream, and I think this was me yearning for my stuff back home, and also being worried that I would use up my limited toiletries while on vacation.

Being pedantic again: the word "professional." (rant)

I'm going to go on another rant about another word that I have overused in the past. And now it has begun to irritate me. 

"Professional."

So I'm on LinkedIn. 

I really dislike LinkedIn, but I feel as though I need it. It's a place where you are typically very disingenuous and everyone else is very disingenuous because of fear. You see everyone else bragging about their accomplishments, and you yourself try to figure out how you can brag about your own accomplishments and have the bragging be received well. It reeks of desperation and insecurity and grandiosity. It's like you're competing in order to cooperate, but actually, all you really want deep down inside is simply to feel secure in the knowledge that you are going to survive and be acknowledged by both strangers and the people you care about. And that will never happen with this little game.

So both on LinkedIn and sometimes off, for many years now, I've noticed that people almost never use the word "professional" unless they're being descriptive (versus judgmental) or being a jerk. The word often isn't neutral anymore. It's like a manipulative little tool to control others' behavior through fear and shame. Because who doesn't want to appear employable in American culture? And if you are making yourself the judge of what professionalism should mean not just to you personally, but to other people as well, you are putting yourself in the dominant position. So it often becomes a power/control thing.

I would say that this is the standard, but at the same time, I have seen plenty of notable exceptions. The biggest is whenever wild, outlandish chaos is the dominant culture. In those situations, "professionalism" is often the height of compliments. I really only see this is in show business. You're around such temperamental, unpredictable, unsafe, unregulated people to such a magnified extent that it really stands out when someone is calm, polite, empathetic, rational, honest, reliable, a good listener, does their job with excellence, holds themselves accountable to standards that protect everyone from harm, etc. To me, that's what professionalism should mean. 

And it doesn't now. Now, in most settings, the word is simply a clue that I'm trying to manipulate.

There's another reason why the word "professionalism" isn't a creepy word when used to compliment a performer. In most jobs in modern civilization, you're paid to suppress the sides to yourself that make you special, unique, and human. So the word "professional" just comes across as this totally un-self-aware internalized acceptance of the very worst aspects of capitalism. But this suppression of what makes one unique and human is not at all true in entertainment or performance--quite the opposite. 

So if you're not in show business... maybe you should temper your use of the word "professional." I would say that the word should only be used as a compliment--not a way to try to control other people's behavior.

I'm going to try to take my own advice, but I've overused this word so often myself...

Narcissistic people crying "abuse." (rants)

I would like to return to the old fashioned notion that the term "abuse" does not refer to things like violating terms of service, disagreeing with someone, or even (more controversially) situations in which you have a misbehaving customer. I think it's wildly offensive when a company like Midjourney refers to making comedic images of the Pope and Donald Trump as "extraordinary abuse." 

I would like "abuse" to mean things like being beaten within an inch of your life by someone who is supposed to love you, or being told you're worthless by someone you see every day for years on end, or otherwise facing a pattern of domination and control. And I think that if these sorts of things have not happened to you, or you are not a therapist, you should probably try to keep the word "abuse" out of your mouth whenever you can. 

One of the biggest problems with using the word "abuse" is that narcissists have appropriated the term. You can't know who's actually at fault or if both are at fault or to what degree, because what if it's just someone with a swollen ego who's sensitive to criticism or someone can't accept their fair share of responsibility in a conflict. 

I've noticed that narcissistic women will often go straight to calling things abusive. Men will be made fun of for saying that they were abused, generally-speaking, so I've noticed that they do it less.

My extremely, extremely narcissistic roommate who I mentioned at the very, very start of this dream diary, would label anyone and everyone who so much as looked at her funny "abusive." It's an effective way to avoid thinking about your own part in human dynamics and to avoid trying to find a solution that satisfies all parties. You're just the victim. You deserve everything--all the apologies and all of the changes in behavior, and you don't owe anything yourself. 

Then you have someone like me, who actually has been beaten to a pulp by her dad, along with many other things therapists tend to label abusive, and I wouldn't even accept from a therapist that I had an abusive childhood, partly because it seemed like a term only melodramatic narcissists exaggerating the truth would use. 

It's just a slap in the face of anyone who has actually experienced domestic violence when narcissists or people sitting comfortably in bureaucracies appropriate and manipulate with the term in order to create shock value that's more likely to get them what they want. And it makes it harder for people in actual domestic violence situations to take the term seriously and recognize what's happened to them.

So that's my hot take: The term "abuse" shouldn't refer to both a woman getting splashed with acid by her ex-boyfriend and saying something that just triggers someone's ego. The difference should be obvious, but unfortunately, with this word, it's not.