I'll share a few.
The coolest dream I ever had was around eight years ago, I think. I was in this kingdom where the king was trying to catch me. So there were soldiers all over the place, and I was hiding under tables and the like. Anyway, it was around this point that I realized I was asleep. And I didn't know how to wake up! (If this happened today, I'd probably just try to open my eyes.) I was terrified. So I asked this "village elder" type how I should wake up. He pointed to a nearby mountain, and said, "If you climb that mountain, you will wake up.". So I started walking up the mountain. This wasn't exactly difficult because it was a smooth path spiraling around the mountain. But before I got to the top, the king's soldiers caught up! I started running, and I got to the top... and instantly I woke up.
In past years, most of my dreams are either based on videogame experiences or can easily be translated into videogame experiences.
Case in point: A few weeks ago I had a very interesting dream. The first half was pretty ordinary stuff, involving friends and family and a space ship to take to a certain
very dangerous place. Well, after a nonsensical quest, whose details I have forgotten, I managed to take the ship (I don't remember how- I might have stolen it), which looked most like the rocket ships in Flash Gordon (the original serial). I took off. And at this point, the dream became a bona fide side-scrolling shmup, in which I moved from right to left. I was doing well, until I reached a boss, and was killed.
...and woke up. It was around 2 AM, I think. I went back to sleep. And had the same dream again. It played out in the same way, except that now I knew exactly what I had to do to get the rocket ship, so I worked more quickly and managed to get it with less trouble. Then, the side-scrolling shmup. I didn't want to lose again, so I decided to experiment. Instead of moving to the left, I started to move up. The farther I went up, the more the view zoomed out, until eventually I was looking at the entire planet on which the game took place from space. The levels were marked clearly by little yellow dots with very iconic illustrations next to them. And it was at this point that I remembered that it was, after all, a video game, so I took the Revolution controller (Hm.), pointed it at my destination, and pressed A. The rocket zoomed down. This little cheat didn't bring me all the way to the end, but it did warp me to the last level, so I was able to get to the end with less trouble.
Then there's the dream involving flying, of course. It was pretty straightforward, except that I recognized the area I was flying over as the setting for another dream. Flying is
so cool. Where are all the bird sims?
Here's the last one, but it'll take some explanation. It was back when Gush Katif (an area in Israel) was being abandoned. My mother is quite an activist, and she regularly went there to visit and show support before the population were thrown out. I never went, because I preferred to play games and watch TV shows at home. But there was always that nagging question: "What if Gush Katif really
is a place like no other? What if I'm missing out on an adventure?" Childish, of course, but I'm sort of desparate for Myst-like exploration, living as I do on a street which loops back around to itself. I had a dream right before the "evacuation" of what I might be missing. I walked to Gush Katif from Jerusalem (I found a shortcut.
), and found that it was indeed like nothing else I'd ever seen. When I woke up, I realized that that dream would make an incredible videogame, so I wrote it down on my blog, adding bits to flesh it out just a little bit more.
Here is what I
wrote. It's pretty faithful to the dream, but I don't remember which parts were added in and which were in the dream.
Quote:
It was late in the evening when the stranger waded into town. At first he had no empathy for the sadness filling the air- it was merely curiosity which drove him here. A large sign stood by the entrance, as if to introduce this strange place, but all it said was “Don't Miss”. Gazing into the wide street in front of him, he perceived not a town but a lake. This was partly because the water reached his torso, but mostly because it simply didn't have the features any town ought to have- people, for instance. There were also no trees or vegetation, no animals, no vehicles, and not a sound but the water beneath him. The sky was perfectly clear, and the moon had only started to rise. To either side of him as he walked were tall walls with so many cracks it was a wonder they still stood. The windows were shut and the curtains drawn, but curiously enough there was some light shining out.
He passed many old walls of increasingly curious design. Some music was being played on some sort of string ensemble -slow, quietly emotional and faintly Jewish- but it faded away. Finally the traveller came across what might be considered a doorway, but the door was nothing more than an old and ratty cloth. He pulled it aside and entered. He wouldn't consider it a house, because the roof did not cover the entirety of the area, but it was certainly a home. A lady was sitting still in a rocking chair, and made no indication that she had noticed the intrusion, or if she did that she cared. Her husband kissed her on the forehead and walked out the door slowly. As he passed through, he faded away.
The floor must have been elevated, because the water only got to knee-level. There was a fireplace in the corner- a fire was burning in it without producing any smoke. Each room was separated by more drapes, and the explorer passed through a kitchen, then a bedroom, and then it seemed as if he had reached another house without realizing. Apparently the entire area was connected. He passed many families which sat or stood in place, and many people faded away as he watched them. Had he decided to return along the path he had come, he would have found that they all had vanished; but he wished to progress. The doors did not distinguish between house and the streets, and he soon understood that the distinction was irrelevant. Each area was distinct, as if there was once good reason to distinguish between them, as if there had been life here once. He moved on, all the while trying to imagine what life was like here back then, but soon reached a dead end. Several children were playing, and he understood that this was what he had come to see.
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