Dreaming...

All my life, I've had pretty vivid dreams. I remember a good chunk of them as well. I still remember a dream I had when I was very young, less than five. It was in black and white, and set at our old house (we moved before I was three). My mom put orange marmalade on my toast. The orange marmalade was in color, like something that was photoshopped, twenty-five years before photoshop existed. I woke up crying because I HATE orange marmalade, and I felt that, in my dream, my mom did it on purpose.

I also remember a nightmare I had when I was not that much older. I went into the basement at my aunt's house and it was lined with tanks of creatures, including an octopus that was coming out of the tank after me. For the record, my aunt had no tanks of any kind in her basement.

Sometimes, I get to visit with people in my dreams. I've had lots of pleasant visits with my grandparents. When I wake up, I have a moment where I'm not sure if they're still here or not, and then sadness washes over me as I realize that they are no longer here.

My dreams have been great in coming up with story ideas. Several of my books contain scenes that were directly inspired by dreams. The collision scene between Declan and Kaitlin in the beginning of Jump, Jive, and Wail is one. I will wake up and instantly know that that dream is meant to go in a book.

When I was in college, I noticed that if I had pepperoni pizza at night, I would have bizarre dreams. I referred to them as pepperoni dreams. Now, I occasionally take melatonin to help me sleep, and the dreams I have when I take it are so far out there,

Last night, I had neither pepperoni nor melatonin. My dreams throughout the night consisted of the following:

1. A tiger in a dense wooded area that was attacking its prey, only to burst through the trees onto a soccer field in the middle of the city and attack the players. I was a witness and ran to a nearby hospital to hide.
2. Going backstage at a Weird Al Yankovic concert (except it wasn't backstage, more like an office building with lots of computers). I got to meet lots of people, but not Weird Al himself.
3. My uncle was trying to steal items from my aunt (his sister) that he thought he should have been entitled to from my grandparents' estate. This included the corner of a silk painting (????) from Spain. For the record, there is no such painting.
4. My aunt ignored her brother and instead gave me clothes from her wardrobe (which does not really exist), much to the dismay of her daughter. She gave me a long pashmina type dress which was much too long so I tried to give it to my cousin who is much taller (she was still mad though).
5. I was preparing to go to England for a book event. I was set to leave in two weeks and just realized that I did not have my passport (true, I don't have a passport).

Dreams 2-5 melted right into each other. I'm sort of bummed that there's nothing that is good story material. I wonder what the heck was going on in my brain last night.