Snotting black

I want a magical forest filled with unicorns

I’ve taken naps at night for as long as I can remember—really hearty ones that last anywhere from six to eight hours. I don’t know much about what goes on during these night naps, but apparently I just lie motionless. The doors to my auditory, olfactory, and oral sensory headquarters are shut and padlocked and my capabilities at controlling drool levels are severely reduced.

If that’s not weird enough, I don’t even remember most of what I do for these periods of time. I’m pretty sure I just lie still, but I could also get up and squirt cheese whizz at the dog. Who knows? I have no control over my body during these dark gaps in my consciousness. It’s quite terrifying.

After waking up from one of these naps, however, sometimes I can kind of remember stuff from the great beyond I just sailed through. Most of it is dark nothingness with wisps of things I’ll never quite remember. Sometimes I think of ham inexplicably. Yet on the rare occasion, I remember a dream and catch a glimpse into the journey my mind sneakily made behind my back.

Dreaming, to put it simply, is amazing. There are endless possibilities of a sleeping mind roaming through territories ungoverned by reality’s mundane laws. The dreams don’t even need to involve hardware or flooring materials. That’s the beauty of dreaming: it’s limitless and free.

This is why I regret almost every single dream I remember. My dreams, far from being fantastic, are disgustingly boring and feel more like a poorly written office memo. Invariably I’m doing the exact same things I do in real life except for sometimes it feels “weird.”  My brain, as a dream-maker, sucks big time. Why can’t it create cooler things for me? Why am I not soaring to a floating feast where I sit in a barrel of spaghetti while eating ribs with Conan O’Brien? Why can’t I zap period clothing into existence and have the sickest privately owned collection of bonnets? Why am I not in the trenches with my best talking animal friends while we defend ourselves against an evil giantess that looks like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz?

They always say something is “the stuff dreams are made of” like it’s a good thing, but this clearly doesn’t apply to all dreams. Mine seem to be made out of dust covered toilet paper rolls, empty ball point pens, generic brand Cheerios called something like Happy-Oh-Nos and the stuff people give away for free on Craig’s List.

I would rather not even remember my dreams if it only means being depressed at my pathetically low dreaming horizon. I mean, I would like to see results from the 6-8 hours a night I put into these naps. All I want to do is wake up and not want to drop acid in order to make my dream life more interesting. Is that too much to ask?

I guess what I’m trying to say is that not all dreams are made of the same stuff, so if you’re buying some you better give the label a good look.