Apr 21, 2009

The Baby's Alive!

by Valerie Ipson

I have a recurring dream that has baffled me for many years. No, it's not the one where I am in school and I'm lost and can't find my classes or realize I haven't been going to class at all and the semester is almost over. That was my previous recurring dream, and frankly, I'm a little concerned that I've stopped having that one because I think it was related to my desire to finish my college degree. Graduating is a real life awake dream that I still want to pursue, but is my subconscious saying the dream is dead? (I'll have to have a little talk with my subconscious, then, plus start figuring out financial aid to pay for the dream!)

Anyway, my current recurring dream has been 'curring over the last several years and it has become increasingly more disturbing. In it I have a baby. Always at least one baby, but sometimes two. So in the beginning, it was good...babies showing up in dreams is happy, fun, often delightful, but now in the dream where I have a baby, I see the baby or find the baby and realize with horror that I have not been feeding the baby. It is barely alive. I have been neglecting my baby. I immediately begin to feed it and hold it and thankfully, it is still alive.

Why? Why am I having this dream? I have eight children--a fair amount, and I also just turned 48--a fair amount. I simply am not having more children. Okay, grandkids? Well, no married kids yet, so that will have to wait. Am I neglecting my own children? I asked a few of them that and they said basically, yes, now leave us alone. Teenagers. They're so funny.

I was excited to come upon this in a book titled One Year to a Writing Life by Susan M. Tiberghien: after relating Maya Angelou's recurring dream, she writes, "I also have a recurring dream..." then she proceeds to describe MY exact dream about the baby and the not feeding and the rushing to feed and it's still alive. This is what she says, "The child is my creative self. I realize that, yes, I have been forgetting my own creativity, my inner child, but that now I am paying attention. The child is still there, still alive."

I was thrilled with this explanation. I've been neglecting my writing baby for too long. It needs my attention, it needs to be fed, and, yes, it's still alive.

I told my husband of the interpretation and he said, "Are you sure it's not that you're neglecting housework?" Husbands. They're so funny.

[NOTE: He may have a point...I was vacuuming Saturday and after vacc'ing up several shades of the always lovely Easter grass that grows in the carpet every spring, I reached down to run my finger along the corner of the entertainment center, and you guessed it, I pulled out Christmas tree pine needles. Eek!]

12 comments:

  1. Interesting! Somehow I think if it was my dream, the baby would demand more and more food, no matter how much I fed it, until I starved myself trying to fill this baby with a bottomless-pit stomach.

    But the last vivid dream I can remember was something about making amends the ghost of some historical character... weird.

    - Chas
    http://music.willowrise.com

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  2. I think you're referring to real live children, Chas! Ha, ha!

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  3. What a great interpretation. Of course, if I were going to be having that dream, I'm sure I'd find out I was pregnant within a few weeks:) Go now and feed your "child."

    I miss you!! I've not gone this long without my ANWA friends before and I can't stand it. See you in May, almost done with my class.

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  4. I just dreamed I had a baby last night. Wow--weird. I'm so not pregnant!

    I like your interpretation, though.

    And, love the housecleaning thing--that's me!

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  5. My recurring dream was just last night. Interpret please (ha). I'm always in a place that turns to water and a huge wave threatens to overwhelm me. Sometimes I wake up before the wave crashes on me. Sometimes I survive. You can't help but think that such recurring dreams mean something can you?

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  6. Love your interpretation...and I can so relate to the house cleaning thing!! With our house up for sale I have been trying to do better...but my 16 year old says she can't stand it because the house looks like no one lives in it! so...I've let it go again.

    I love dreams...I know Heavenly Father uses them to get me to pay attention when I have been too busy in the day to listen.

    Hey...don't forget...Stephenie Meyer's books all began because of a dream she had.

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  7. Okay, Valerie, I'm 49 last week and have seven children. I know how you feel. Although the dream may be your creative self, it may also be that for so many years you actually had a baby to care for that a part of your subconcious can't believe that there isn't one somewhere you should be caring for and you've just forgotten.

    There are still days when the house is quiet that I call out for a toddler without thinking- or maybe that's just alzheimer's.

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  8. Christine, you may be right! Maybe my subconscious is just a little slow in catching up to my reality. Someday I'll be dreaming about a teenager I find that I haven't been feeding and boy is it going to be angry.

    Anyone have an interpretation for Terri's water dream?

    Thanks for all your fun comments!

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  9. I was thinking that the water was stress, and the wave is more stress than you think you can handle. You didn't mention that you ever drown, so that must mean that you do always survive what is heaped upon you. My $.02.

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  10. You're cute, Lance! (That's my husband, ladies!)

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  11. At least I think it is... Lance...honey...is that you?

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