On Dreams

What makes us remember some dreams and not others?

Photo by NOAA on Unsplash

What makes us remember some dreams and not others?

My wife is a notorious dreamer. Every night when her head hits the pillow, it’s like her mind just opens up. It has her embarking on wild adventures, meeting with quirky characters who’re mostly just slightly-off versions of real people, and not a few of her dreams contain morals or philosophical positions.

But the crazier thing is, she remembers them. All of them. And not just in a vague, “oh, you know, it was probably Sunday, but don’t quote me on that” kind of way. She remembers every single detail.

Me? I don’t remember shit. I’m so bad at remembering my dreams that for years I thought I didn’t dream at all. If I were to count, I’d say 80% of my dream is gone 10 seconds after waking. By the time a minute has passed, you can call 95% of it bye bye.

But there is one dream I will never forget.

I was in my childhood bedroom. Not just in the dream, but in reality also.

At some point, it may have been around four a.m., I woke up in a panic. I sat up in bed, feeling for my heart which threatened to burst out of my chest.

I remember I was covered in cold sweat. The undershirt I had on was drenched, and I was shivering a little, or more like slightly trembling.

After a few seconds I realized the room was filled with light. Not as though someone had turned on the lights, nor as if it were morning, but as though the moon had left its place in the sky to stand before my window. It was that sort of blueish, cool light that leaves you confused as to whether it is light at all or something else.

I looked up and saw that the window was open. Then, instantly, the room filled up with the sounds of a raging storm. Before, the dream had been silent. Now it was anything but.

It’s the next few seconds that will never leave my mind.

This is what I remember. Through the open window, a bolt of lightning came into the room and struck me in the chest.

This is what I also remember. I did not feel a thing.

Lightning had struck me, yet I stood unharmed.

The dream ends there, as suddenly as it began.

The night in question must have been around four years ago. I’ve thought about the dream since, incessantly, though I still can make no sense of it.

I could, of course, do a search for “lightning dream meaning” and likely find something wildly specific that feels written for me but was in fact created to be as widely applicable as possible, like the horoscope. And maybe that would be enough to settle the matter. But I don’t trust in simple wisdom. How can dreams be so easy to interpret? Wouldn’t making sense of someone’s dream mean making sense of their mind?

Can we really trust a stranger to tell us who we are?

By now, you might be wondering what the point of this essay is. The truth is I don’t know there is one, except that I needed to write it. Except that I needed to let this out, because it’s been sitting in my head too long. Except that maybe, some part of me hoped you could help me understand.

But can I really trust a stranger to tell me who I am?