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I’m not sure what it is about nap time dreaming, but the images seem extraordinarily vivid, the perception of reality more enforced, making it harder to wake up. That was certainly the case yesterday.
I was walking somewhere, no place in particular, at least none that I recognized. The locale was more rural than urban, the path more a trail than a sidewalk. The atmosphere springlike, neither too warm nor too cold. It was sort of the “Goldilocks Zone” of dream environments. If there were other people or creatures about, I did not notice them. I am not terribly good at recalling dreams, so I might be missing some of the details. But what I definitely am not missing is the bizarre fact that when I glanced back over my shoulder the landscape was rolling up behind me. The trail, trees, grass, etc., everything, was rolling up behind me like a giant version of those round hay bails one sees in fields nowadays. I stopped, and the “world bail” stopped. Backed up a bit and the bail unwound a bit. Started forward and the bail continued to wind up. I woke up. OK, pulse slightly elevated. It was a really weird dream.
Then, as is my wont, I began to try to unravel a bit of the weirdness of the dream. I don’t, as an old friend was prone to do, see dreams in a Freudlike reality. Whenever red meat appeared in one of her dreams it either represented her husband, or was an indication that she should cut red meat out of her diet - she seemed to give herself some interpretive flexibility there. But neither do I just shrug my shoulders, mutter “weird dream” and get up to take the trash out. I do think that dreams give us an opportunity to consider some alternative interpretations of our existence. Here is where I am with the “Weird World Bail Dream.”
First I need to make it clear that I am pretty much in agreement with the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics - the idea that there are many worlds that exist simultaneously and parallel to the everyday “reality” that we walk around in. Furthermore, given the incredible physical and metaphysical complexity that such a universe implies, it doesn’t seem strange at all to me that some of those wires get crossed occasionally. Sort of a “cosmic butt-call” to use the technical jargon.
OK, so I wonder, if the World Bail is rolling up the reality of the world in which my dream is taking place, what is left? I do my best to remember if I could see anything left over behind the World Bail in my dream. But try as I might I draw a blank - pretty much literally a blank. But rather than seeing that as a dead end, I choose to treat it as permission to fill in the blank. And I choose to fill it in with the many worlds.
To switch analogies on you, perhaps the roll that is following me around isn’t so much a cosmic bail of hay as it is a cosmic apple peel. You know, when you are peeling an apple and you try to peel the apple in “one go” as the Brits would say; remove the entire peel without it breaking. And what is left? The apple, of course. But in the many worlds view of the universe, what lies below the peel is another peel - another world ready for us to experience.
However, it seems somehow inappropriate to want to hop down and start peeling that new world before finishing this one. A better course of action would seem to be to stop looking over my dream shoulder at the bail following me along the path and concentrate on what lies ahead. Those other bails, peels, what have you, will - most likely - always be there. The current path, although no doubt rocky, still leads to ample opportunities to Foster Harmony, Enable Beauty, Distill Complexity and Oppose Harm.
Oh my! Look at the clock up on the corner of the computer! Coming right up on nap time!
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