08/07/01
Beware The Mary Sue
I had a few detailed ones the other night but didn't take notes and so forgot them.
Last night, the first few are rather vague. In this one, somebody at a site--perhaps it was FanFiction.net--was going to write some kind of story wherein they took on the part of Bulma from Dragon Ball Z. I warned them, "Be careful you don't write a Mary Sue." I THINK that's what the term is...a "Mary Sue" is a fanfiction story where the writer creates a character usually based on themselves and makes them just about perfect in every way, so they're completely unbelievable. Anyway I knew it would be a bad idea for this person to do this since Mary Sues are generally reviled by fanfiction writers, from what I can tell.
Mark Of Distinction
I was reading a story snippet and it must have been from one of my stories. In it, one character--a guy--was mad at another character of mine, a woman, who I think was this one character named D. She's kind of...slutty...but she does it for a purpose...hard to explain without my having posted the story. In any case, she had some kind of mark, which was then a large tattoo (dark colored, like a circle with circles inside it--a mandala?) on her arm or back of her shoulder, and this guy was chewing her out for getting it...I think it had something to do with her being a slut. <:) *cough* She just kind of endured everything he said before pulling her shirt up (not exposing herself, just the tattoo) and showing it to him and telling him how she'd REALLY gotten it. I think it turned out she had been attacked by some guy and he'd had the thing put on her by force, like a mutilation. This guy who was chewing her out had it completely wrong. This little scenario was supposed to make her look stronger.
If they were not the same dream, then this may have shifted into "Ready For School."
Ready For School
If they were not in fact the same dream, then this may have shifted out of "Mark Of
Distinction."
I needed to get ready to go somewhere. So I started packing stuff...I got a notebook, and then decided to get another, new (?), one, instead. I have a lot of fresh notebooks in real life. In my dream it was daytime, perhaps late morning or early afternoon (11-1), and dim in my room but as if the windows were uncovered. And cleaner, too. o_o I noticed two notebooks sitting on top of each other--a blue one and a teal one. I think I took the blue one, but I may have changed my mind. Then I went out into the living room and Ma, in the dining room, was telling me (not snottily, though) to hurry up and get ready...for SCHOOL. Turns out she was taking me (or was I riding the bus?) to school! This didn't strike me as strange. I started to hurry a bit more, picking up first one mechanical pencil from the end table, then another (perhaps a transparent red one). Then I decided I wanted to bring a book to read, and I got two of those as well. (Notice how the number two keeps showing up in this one?) I think they may have been true crime books, small paperbacks. Then I wanted to bring a blanket/my blanket (?) along, and was pondering how best to fit it into my backpack. ?? I seemed to have to get a lot of stuff ready...I was hurried, and in a hurry, but not particularly panicked. I actually felt rather all right despite the situation.
The Door Is Open...
In real life my brother and his wife, Shannon, are up visiting from Georgia. In my dream, I was dozing in bed and Shannon came up and knocked on my door. First off she said something like, "Your chance to show your wild side," and I think she may have wanted me to get up so we could go somewhere and have some fun. Whatever. I think I then delayed getting up, being so tired, and the very last words I heard her say as she cracked open my door, before I really DID wake up, were, "The door is open..."
What's For Lunch?
I was at what seemed to be the elementary school in layout, but was more like high school in atmosphere. I was in line, getting my lunch. The line was where it would be in the elementary school, off to the left, but it was more out in the hall--the food area itself, I mean. I had the feeling I was a bit late and they were going to start putting the food away soon so I approached with trepidation, hoping I wasn't bothering them too much. I HATE annoying people. I got close and examined the selection. First, before I got there, I had seen lots of Kentucky Fried Chicken boxes and buckets, and so assumed they were serving chicken. But when I got there all I could seem to see were...bowls of mashed potatoes dripping with gravy. Mmmmmm, they looked so good! There were bowls just lined up along the counter, these BIG bowls, with these HUGE round scoops of potatoes in them and what seemed to be chicken gravy with flecks of parsley in it just dripping off the top. Mmmmmm. :P I examined these a bit, then looked around to see if there was anything ELSE. I mean, JUST mashed potatoes? I could have sworn they had more before. Maybe it was just because I was so late. The people running the food line stared at me with a kind of annoyed "Hurry it up, please" expression but I was having such trouble deciding. AGGH!! Limited selection and I STILL couldn't make up my mind! First off--I had no bowl of my own (a bowl was substituting as the lunch tray), so I couldn't carry everything I wanted to get--and I was STARVED! So I was looking around to see if they had any empty bowls there already. Yes, they did; but they were sitting off to the right, and I knew they were dirty, other people's empty bowls, sitting behind in little stacks. *sigh* (Somewhere along in here--perhaps when I first came up to the line--I had had five dollars, in ones, in my hand and had flipped through them, first going to give three (?) to the person taking the money--who was Emily, a girl I knew in high school. But then I wasn't sure if it would be more than that, and I didn't want to have to give her more money for going over the price, so I think I gave her all five and hoped she wasn't too annoyed that it was ones and not a single bill. Man was I afraid of upsetting anybody!)
Well, I think I finally got some kind of container to put a bowl of potatoes in, but then I noticed the dessert section to the right and HAD to check it out too. And now--HERE was variety! Every item seemed to have fruit involved so far, but MAN did it all look good! I must have been drooling. Taking a bowl of potatoes (mine seemed different from the other gravy-filled containers) with me, I looked over the desserts. It was all fruits and gelatins and whipped creams and everything--YUM! I think I picked out one that I really wanted to get, but then I got sidetracked and couldn't locate it again for a bit--everything NOW seemed to be melon slices, and I don't really like melon, especially not that strange yellow stuff. :( I just kept looking, and eventually the food reverted to normal--melon slices, yes, but also some berries and such in a whipped cream/gelatin mix. Oh boy! (I have written down "go back to 2nd bowl, hard to find--dirty 1s--dessert I wanted hard to find," so perhaps it was here that I had trouble finding a clean bowl--I didn't want my mashed potatoes and dessert in the same container!--rather than earlier.) ANYWAY, I think I started scooping up some of that gelatin mix, then picked up a few more things--I just couldn't seem to get enough--then I found the fruit I'd really wanted and, burdened down with this stuff, I believe I finally made it to the checkout--and the students running it must have been relieved!
(In that dream, lunch itself seemed to be being held out in the hall since there were so many people around. But it wasn't overly crowded, just busy.)
Cheating Shannon
This dream was very distressing. Dad and I were at home during the daytime when we heard a knocking at the back door. Now, in real life, our first reaction is to hide. That's right--BOTH of us. He used to make ME go answer the door and tell whoever was there that he was "gone with friends" even if his vehicle was still parked outside. Until one day I told him I wasn't going to do that anymore--after he had told me to lie to the person at the door, and then showed up behind me right while I was lying to my uncle, making me look like a complete idiot!! Anyway, anyway, anyway...in the dream we heard the knocking and we both hid, waiting for whoever it was to go away. I went out into the living room and cautiously looked around, to see a pickup truck turn either out of our driveway or around the corner on the sideroad and drive away. Assuming that had been who was here, I went back to Dad and said, "It's okay, they left." He seemed uncertain and again I said they were gone, but then we went out to the utility room and found that there was, indeed, still someone at the door. It was a guy. And he was fighting with a woman, grabbing her arms and shaking her.
Dad opened the door--it was overcast and warm outside--but I was the one to react. "HEY!" I shouted. I couldn't see the man's face as he was turned away, him to the left, the woman to the right, and I couldn't see her as he was shaking her beyond my sight, past the door frame. "Stop it! Stop doing that!" I shouted, because there is NO excuse for a man to shake a woman like that. He may have pushed her away, or Dad and I may have intervened--but that was when the truth dawned on us--the guy was my brother!! And the woman he'd been shaking--it was his wife!
Of course, the two of us (though Dad seemed pretty neutral and uninvolved) wanted to know what was going on. I was appalled that my brother would be doing such a thing.
He turned to us, tearful and devastated. He didn't say much, and he didn't say anything directly about the subject--but what he did say made the truth clear. She had cheated on him, once, in the past; he had forgiven her, with the promise that she would never do it again. But...she had. She'd cheated on him TWICE. And now he couldn't take it anymore. From the look of it, he had loved her very much, and this was a horrible blow for him.
For me, as well. Infidelity--to break one's trust--is one of the worst things I believe someone can do to another. And so I felt my brother's pain as acutely as if it were my own. I started crying along with him. (His wife, Shannon, had gone off to the side and was crying herself, evidently ashamed.) First Eric said something about "Braveheart"--the guy Mel Gibson played--and then it was as if I were looking at the cover for a video, and it had Mel Gibson's character, with the blue facepaint, on the front, cradling a woman in his arms; she seemed to be dead, or unconscious, in some light-colored Little House On The Prairie-style garb (maybe with a bonnet?); Mel's character seemed grieved. The point I got was that this was his wife and she had cheated on him, and had ended up dead. (I don't think by his hand, but I'm not sure.) Eric was telling us that his situation resembled that of Braveheart, so perhaps there was a connection, even a blood connection, between the two of them. He then wandered off toward where the sandbox used to be (it was still sandy in my dream, hasn't really been that way in years), and I followed him, desperate to console him. I couldn't stand to see him so devastated.
I believe he knelt down in the sand to cry, and I knelt down beside him, maybe putting my arm around his shoulders. I wanted him to know I was there for him and knew how he felt. I couldn't believe what she'd done. Twice! How could she DO that to him?
The thing is, while I was trying to comfort him, it was as if he didn't want me there, was kind of trying to ignore me, or inching away, as if trying to let me know he didn't want me so close. This hurt me even more. I may have tried to get closer again, only to get the same reaction. Why was he pushing me away when I wanted to help him? I was beyond confused now, and so hurt.
Thankfully that's all I can remember of that particular dream...
2001 Dreams
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