In Which I Am Visited by My Old Friend, Sleep Disturbance

Funny dreams, lately.

There was the one where my program director was leading a few of us up a rickety old wooden staircase, like the one in Vertigo. She was happy and social, which matches well to the reality of who she is as a person, but poorly to her persona (we decided long ago it's more fun, and somehow more emotionally accurate, if her persona is about calling us fat and making us cry). There was something at the top of the stairs she wanted me to see. And of course, I woke up before we got to the top.

(I have a theory that the brain can actually work backwards in dreams, and then rearrange the narrative in memory, sort of like the retina sees an upside-down image, but that's a tangent. It does, however, explain some things.)

Last night, I worked until I lost my mental sharpness; then I puttered around until I felt tired; then I puttered a little more until I thought I was physically wiped enough to sleep.

hah.

But then again, when I thought it must be 2, it was 4:15. So it was a good night. But the good REM sleep doesn't hit me until it's just about alarm time. This morning, I had a poignant and sad little dream. It was even in black and white, which my brain uses for mood purposes.

Somebody I haven't talked to in a while had, in the dream, died. Not right then; she'd been dead for a while. But in Gaimanesque fashion, it wasn't a big deal. We spoke on the phone every now and then. But since I had to change phones after I dropped mine in down a storm drain during winter break, I didn't have her number (in... death-land I guess) in my phone. And I couldn't find the slip of paper which held it. You can't just look that stuff up, y'know?

And so I got to go through the frantic-looking phase, then the coming-to-terms with having lost the thing phase, and finally the acceptance that those days are gone phase. All before waking up.

Which in some ways is really refreshing. But I did just email some people I haven't touched base with in a while. Message received! Thank you, Messrs. Hypothalamus and Brainstem!