Dreams
So last night was filled with a couple of poignant and highly depressing dreams, which I remember considerably better than usual.
The first: I was at some place, I’m not sure where except to say I think it was supposed to be some odd version of Tibet, where the premise was if you go on the big hill and bring back one of the scary animals, we’ll cook it for you. I will also say, I was not me precisely, but some male traveler or something like that, and I thought this was a good idea. So I climbed the mountain and was confronted with a huge, scary bull thing that was not at all happy to see me, and was blocking my path back down the hill. As I stood there, trying to figure out what to do, and wondering why I thought this was a good idea in the first place, another animal (this one best approximated by a yak, I think) came and started fighting with the first one. I did what any sensible human being would do: I took the opportunity and ran like hell back down the hill.
Somehow I knew the yak had killed the other thing (that wonderful omniscience that dreams occasionally give you) and it was coming down the hill after me. I thought I should have run, but something told me I wasn’t actually in danger. The yak appeared and communicated somehow (not in words, yaks don’t talk) that it wanted to go with me and that it knew what it was doing. It even said I could ride on its back if I wanted. I can’t remember if I did.
Of course, I knew that this yak’s fate, were I to take it back to the place I came from, was that it would be cooked and eaten, but I didn’t know where else to go, so I went. And while I was sitting around, torn with indecision about what I should do (since wouldn’t it be odd to have befriended a yak one was supposed to eat?), the animals were all tied up and prepared for the little ceremony thing where they were going to be cooked.
When I came out of my stupor, the animals were all tied in a line, caught up in some sick parade where they were heading toward a giant furnace. It suddenly occurred to me how horrible cruel that was and how sweet my yak had been and I started screaming and crying and trying to stop the procession. Nobody would listen; this is what they do, and they’ve had crazy people show up before. So I went and put myself between the front of the line and the door of the furnace and made some big speech about how, even if it’s only my yak, they had to cut him free. This time, I felt like I got through to some people, but others had gone around me and started leading the animals in. I was almost too late to save my yak, but he got stuck in the doorway and I screamed and yelled that we had to pull him back out. The person leading it said that it would be a bad idea, since he had seen what was going on and would only be hurt and angry, and therefore dangerous, and I said I would take responsibility. He gave in, gave all responsibility for the yak over to me, and we pulled him out and cut him free.
The yak, I could tell, would have easily killed anyone else in that room for doing that to him, but he didn’t because he was in my control. To me, he was just grateful because I had saved his life. I apologized profusely, because his face had gotten singed while he was stuck, and his back had gotten cut when I set him free of the binds. He told me, in his odd yak non-language, that it was okay and he forgave me, and that we should go back to the mountain. So I climbed the mountain with my yak, and oddly along the way, he got smaller and smaller, until finally he could fit into the palm of my hand. I was afraid to go up to the mountain then, because he wouldn’t be able to defend me, and I wouldn’t be able to defend him. Again, he told me it was okay. It turned out the animals up there had some sort of legend that foretold all this; when we got to the top, they basically ignored me and they accepted him as a sort of god, and he told them about the dangers of humans and the story of the one who was different.
I’m not sure what happened after that.
Then I had another dream. I was me in this one. The first part isn’t important, though it went on for a while. I was in a big house, and the family was over and it was some holiday because I was looking for presents that people had hidden around. The first major event was that a tiger (who I already knew, apparently, and who did speak in language) was in the back yard. He wanted to know what I was looking for so intently, and I told him. Then he came into the house and I ran after him telling him that he shouldn’t, and had to explain to him that even if he was trying to be friendly, humans are pretty fragile and he might hurt them accidentally. He was sad (since it meant he would have to stay away from my family, basically), but he understood. Somewhere in the conversation, his sister showed up as well and tried to console him. At the end of it, he left all of a sudden. His sister stayed.
I looked out to where he had run to, and saw that a war had started. It was a fight between tigers that befriended humans and the ones that were proud to still be wild. I watched, but I had lost track of my tiger friend in the confusion, and I couldn’t bear to watch anymore, because I wasn’t sure now if he was one of the ones that had been killed. The sister told me to run and hide, that they would come after me too because I was a human who had tamed a tiger. I took what mementos I had of my tiger friend and ran through the house looking for a good hiding place. I finally stuck them in a bathroom cabinet, then ran around touching other things so they would have trouble tracking it down by my scent. By that time, they were there.
They came in human form (apparently they had powerful magic?), but I knew who they were. The first was nice to me-she was only looking for the things I had hidden. The second chased me, but the sister had whispered to me to hide in the well (which was just out the back door. Did I mention this was obviously not my house?) so I did. She saw me jump in, but since I had hidden, she decided to let me go. While I was hiding, a third came along, and stopped because she could smell me. She couldn’t see me because I was well-hidden, but she knew I was there, so she pulled out some little animal that looked vaguely like a purple squirrel, but apparently could remember scents forever, and recorded mine, saying I would make a tasty snack when their conquest was over. Needless to say, that was a little scary.
When I thought the coast was clear, I went back inside and was greeted by four creatures who looked like gnomes or Christmas elves or something, but apparently they were on my side. They had found a good hiding place. They cast some magic on me that made me look like them and we ran to where there was a giant tree trunk laying on the ground with a bunch of gnome-ish figurines next to it. If we stayed perfectly still, we could probably blend in. Unfortunately, we had been pursued, and the group chasing up still had their damned sense of smell. One of them identified us as living creatures almost immediately. We tried to keep up the act, but I sensed that it was failing, so I pretended to be some other magical race that apparently existed, which were some sort of goblins or gremlin type things. The impersonation involved curling my fingers to be a little claw-like and repeated rough-voiced cries of “grema grema!” and “my tree!” I was apparently very convincing. Sadly for me, the “my tree” ploy kept me in the area while they tested the others of us (there was some term they used for what they were looking for that I can’t remember, aside from it started with a D, and they had tests to prove whether it was actually one of them or not) and I ended up being tested. So in the end, I had been caught. I’m not sure what they were planning on doing to me, but I’m sure it wasn’t anything good. I never found out because I woke up. Probably better that way.
God, I woke up like "no, no, no, no, NO, dammit" and was really depressed. I guess the one with the yak worked out okay, but man. I have no idea where these came from, aside from maybe the stay thought I had sometime yesterday that I get along really well with animals because I'm really empathic. But it's not like it was something I thought about a lot.
Anybody out there and expert in interpreting dreams? I feel like these ones deserve an explanation.
[edit]Yep, definitely Tibet and a yak.
This is a Tibetan yak, and almost exactly what he looked like. He was a bit lighter color, though.
I've decided the first one (the one that was blocking my path) was a water buffalo. It just took me a while to actually place the mental image with a name.
The first: I was at some place, I’m not sure where except to say I think it was supposed to be some odd version of Tibet, where the premise was if you go on the big hill and bring back one of the scary animals, we’ll cook it for you. I will also say, I was not me precisely, but some male traveler or something like that, and I thought this was a good idea. So I climbed the mountain and was confronted with a huge, scary bull thing that was not at all happy to see me, and was blocking my path back down the hill. As I stood there, trying to figure out what to do, and wondering why I thought this was a good idea in the first place, another animal (this one best approximated by a yak, I think) came and started fighting with the first one. I did what any sensible human being would do: I took the opportunity and ran like hell back down the hill.
Somehow I knew the yak had killed the other thing (that wonderful omniscience that dreams occasionally give you) and it was coming down the hill after me. I thought I should have run, but something told me I wasn’t actually in danger. The yak appeared and communicated somehow (not in words, yaks don’t talk) that it wanted to go with me and that it knew what it was doing. It even said I could ride on its back if I wanted. I can’t remember if I did.
Of course, I knew that this yak’s fate, were I to take it back to the place I came from, was that it would be cooked and eaten, but I didn’t know where else to go, so I went. And while I was sitting around, torn with indecision about what I should do (since wouldn’t it be odd to have befriended a yak one was supposed to eat?), the animals were all tied up and prepared for the little ceremony thing where they were going to be cooked.
When I came out of my stupor, the animals were all tied in a line, caught up in some sick parade where they were heading toward a giant furnace. It suddenly occurred to me how horrible cruel that was and how sweet my yak had been and I started screaming and crying and trying to stop the procession. Nobody would listen; this is what they do, and they’ve had crazy people show up before. So I went and put myself between the front of the line and the door of the furnace and made some big speech about how, even if it’s only my yak, they had to cut him free. This time, I felt like I got through to some people, but others had gone around me and started leading the animals in. I was almost too late to save my yak, but he got stuck in the doorway and I screamed and yelled that we had to pull him back out. The person leading it said that it would be a bad idea, since he had seen what was going on and would only be hurt and angry, and therefore dangerous, and I said I would take responsibility. He gave in, gave all responsibility for the yak over to me, and we pulled him out and cut him free.
The yak, I could tell, would have easily killed anyone else in that room for doing that to him, but he didn’t because he was in my control. To me, he was just grateful because I had saved his life. I apologized profusely, because his face had gotten singed while he was stuck, and his back had gotten cut when I set him free of the binds. He told me, in his odd yak non-language, that it was okay and he forgave me, and that we should go back to the mountain. So I climbed the mountain with my yak, and oddly along the way, he got smaller and smaller, until finally he could fit into the palm of my hand. I was afraid to go up to the mountain then, because he wouldn’t be able to defend me, and I wouldn’t be able to defend him. Again, he told me it was okay. It turned out the animals up there had some sort of legend that foretold all this; when we got to the top, they basically ignored me and they accepted him as a sort of god, and he told them about the dangers of humans and the story of the one who was different.
I’m not sure what happened after that.
Then I had another dream. I was me in this one. The first part isn’t important, though it went on for a while. I was in a big house, and the family was over and it was some holiday because I was looking for presents that people had hidden around. The first major event was that a tiger (who I already knew, apparently, and who did speak in language) was in the back yard. He wanted to know what I was looking for so intently, and I told him. Then he came into the house and I ran after him telling him that he shouldn’t, and had to explain to him that even if he was trying to be friendly, humans are pretty fragile and he might hurt them accidentally. He was sad (since it meant he would have to stay away from my family, basically), but he understood. Somewhere in the conversation, his sister showed up as well and tried to console him. At the end of it, he left all of a sudden. His sister stayed.
I looked out to where he had run to, and saw that a war had started. It was a fight between tigers that befriended humans and the ones that were proud to still be wild. I watched, but I had lost track of my tiger friend in the confusion, and I couldn’t bear to watch anymore, because I wasn’t sure now if he was one of the ones that had been killed. The sister told me to run and hide, that they would come after me too because I was a human who had tamed a tiger. I took what mementos I had of my tiger friend and ran through the house looking for a good hiding place. I finally stuck them in a bathroom cabinet, then ran around touching other things so they would have trouble tracking it down by my scent. By that time, they were there.
They came in human form (apparently they had powerful magic?), but I knew who they were. The first was nice to me-she was only looking for the things I had hidden. The second chased me, but the sister had whispered to me to hide in the well (which was just out the back door. Did I mention this was obviously not my house?) so I did. She saw me jump in, but since I had hidden, she decided to let me go. While I was hiding, a third came along, and stopped because she could smell me. She couldn’t see me because I was well-hidden, but she knew I was there, so she pulled out some little animal that looked vaguely like a purple squirrel, but apparently could remember scents forever, and recorded mine, saying I would make a tasty snack when their conquest was over. Needless to say, that was a little scary.
When I thought the coast was clear, I went back inside and was greeted by four creatures who looked like gnomes or Christmas elves or something, but apparently they were on my side. They had found a good hiding place. They cast some magic on me that made me look like them and we ran to where there was a giant tree trunk laying on the ground with a bunch of gnome-ish figurines next to it. If we stayed perfectly still, we could probably blend in. Unfortunately, we had been pursued, and the group chasing up still had their damned sense of smell. One of them identified us as living creatures almost immediately. We tried to keep up the act, but I sensed that it was failing, so I pretended to be some other magical race that apparently existed, which were some sort of goblins or gremlin type things. The impersonation involved curling my fingers to be a little claw-like and repeated rough-voiced cries of “grema grema!” and “my tree!” I was apparently very convincing. Sadly for me, the “my tree” ploy kept me in the area while they tested the others of us (there was some term they used for what they were looking for that I can’t remember, aside from it started with a D, and they had tests to prove whether it was actually one of them or not) and I ended up being tested. So in the end, I had been caught. I’m not sure what they were planning on doing to me, but I’m sure it wasn’t anything good. I never found out because I woke up. Probably better that way.
God, I woke up like "no, no, no, no, NO, dammit" and was really depressed. I guess the one with the yak worked out okay, but man. I have no idea where these came from, aside from maybe the stay thought I had sometime yesterday that I get along really well with animals because I'm really empathic. But it's not like it was something I thought about a lot.
Anybody out there and expert in interpreting dreams? I feel like these ones deserve an explanation.
[edit]Yep, definitely Tibet and a yak.
This is a Tibetan yak, and almost exactly what he looked like. He was a bit lighter color, though.
I've decided the first one (the one that was blocking my path) was a water buffalo. It just took me a while to actually place the mental image with a name.