I can’t get dream men out of my head
I have a long-running joke with myself about men from my past. They started showing up in my dreams when I was expecting my first child, about seven years ago. Why they come, I don’t know, but they were frequent visitors throughout all three of my pregnancies, and they still drop by occasionally. I call them The Parade of Unrealized Boyfriends.
Dreams where these men come marching are decidedly G-rated. No steamy scenes, no clandestine meetings; nothing that anyone past the age of 12 would call “good stuff.” Perhaps it’s a lack of imagination, or maybe there’s a deeper psychological phenomenon at work, but there’s nothing about these nocturnal visits that would make me blush in the morning.
Meet some of the dream men:
- Carlos: High school acquaintance. Handsome brainiac. Now a financial advisor (like my husband) and a philanthropist for gay and lesbian causes (unlike my husband.)
- Robert: High school friend. Tall brainiac. We nearly dated in college but never took that leap. I think he’s somewhere in Texas.
- Evan: Elementary school friend. Tall brainiac. (I’m detecting a theme.) Rescued me from eternal humiliation in the fifth grade play by volunteering to be Prince Charming to my Snow White when no one else would.
These people are from so long ago that they’re still boys in my dreams, yet I’m puzzled why they haunt me. In the beginning, I chalked it up to crazy hormonal changes from my pregnancies, but now I wonder if it’s more than that.
Maybe it’s: Anxiety? Past anxiety dreams have included the upside-down roller-coaster dream, the elevator-tipping-over-backwards dream, and my favorite, the all-the-teeth-falling-out-of-my-mouth dream. But there’s nothing scary about my Parade dreams, and they don’t seem to be caused by worries or stress.
Loose ends? Maybe there is unfinished business with these men. I didn’t date any of them; are they coming to me because we never connected on a deeper level?
Escape? Maybe it’s a by-product of getting older, having more responsibilities, and missing earlier, less-demanding times.
Sometimes I wonder if I show up in anyone else’s dreams. Does anyone from my past ever wake up, shake his head and say, “Her again?” If so, I hope he remembers me pleasantly and with affection, like I remember those marching men from my past. And I hope that nothing in his dream would make either of us blush.
JULIE FAY, Milton