Normally on Sunday morning I would be at my table at the Dawg writing. But I have cleaning to do for an inspection on Tuesday and can't afford to give up that much time today. Note to self: You WILL recoup those three hours sometime this week.
Last night I had a dream in which I was on safari in Africa. Africa has been on my bucket list since age 6. I was absolutely thrilled to be jounced down potted roads wearing my pith helmet and laughing. One must wear a pith helmet on safari and being in Africa, one must laugh. Dreams.
We are watching a herd of elephants and I am taking pictures. Just in awe that I am finally here and in the presence of wild elephants! The herd begins to turn toward us and the driver slowly takes us further away down the road. A particularly big bull, charges toward us his massive ears spread wide. We accelerate and take off down the road increasing the distance between us and them.
That's when it happens. We hit a particularly huge pot hole that rattles my teeth. The camera strap is bounced off my neck and the camera goes flying out the open top of the vehicle. It lands squarely in the middle of the road where the bull elephant, still charging toward us, steps on it.
I'm never scared. Never fussed. Not about the charging bull. Not about the loss of my camera. I'm only slightly less ebullient.
Thinking about this dream, many pieces make so much sense. My love of Africa and me desire to safari. My interest in photography. So why did my brain kick this out and why now?
Hmmmmmm......
My occupation is research scientist. Yeahyeah, it's less sexy than it sounds. Mostly this means I set up things to happen and then sit and watch. I am a paid observer. That's right. I get paid to notice stuff which is perfect for my personality. That's right even in my own life I have a tendency to hang back or around the edges and watch as things unfold, trying all the while to decipher the underlying pattern. I'm an out and out introvert. Or should that be an in and in introvert? That reinforces the observer pattern. Left to my own devices I would be quite happen watching life unfold all around me and scribbling in notebooks like Proust.
What's that got to do with my dream?
Even in my dream I am the observer. Happy. Traveling. Fulfilling my dreams. But still in a way that doesn't engage me fully in the action.
I am the critic not the actor
I am the watcher not the watched
I am the passive voice not the active one
I have fallen into a place where I am distanced from my life. Distanced from my feelings. Watching it all unfold, but not really in there. The reasons for this are many, I won't bore you by listing them. But many of them are quite good reasons. I will just say that "in there" is a place where I get bruised up and knocked around, where my emotions tumble and churn in my belly, where I am scared shitless.
In that safe place of observer, none of that touches me. I can operate without engagement.
That is until the big bull elephant charges sending me down the rutted road.
That is until the pot hole that jars my internal organs to new locations.
That is until the camera flies out of my hand.
The camera that is the way I record and document.
The tool that keeps me distant
That keeps me observer bound
The camera is destroyed
And I am left to figure out life from this new place
A new place of churning emotion
of rutted paths and overgrown trails
I cannot be the observer here.
Good thing I dreamed the pith helmet.
I think I'm gonna need it.
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