I wondered if and when this would start happening. ?Last night I had a dream that I was attending some sort of banquet at Emmanuel College (where I start as an assistant professor this fall). ?When I got there, I was informed that I was going to be playing a clarinet solo, accompanied by the Vice President of Academic Affairs on the piano, for the entertainment of all the faculty. ?
Of course, in dream-world, I had not been told about this, and moreoever, as in real life, I hadn’t played a clarinet for some twelve years. ?But, as often happens in dreams, instead of simply saying that I couldn’t do it, I started looking around for a clarinet, and I found the one that my parents bought when I was a sixth grader, looking as neglected as one might expect, corks gone and wood rotting. ?Nonetheless, I assembled it, only to find that I had no reed. ?So I quickly pulled a suitable-looking leaf off of a potted plant in the area and tried to rig the mouthpiece to make a sound. ?It sounded terrible, but at least it made some sort of noise.
Then I turned around and discovered that the sheet music was gone. ?I looked on, around, and under the table, then got the distinct feeling that the sheet music was under the couch cushion where Emmanuel’s English faculty was sitting. ?I asked them to get up so that I could get the sheet music, but they wouldn’t. ?So the VP offered to go photocopy the clarinet part, and while he was gone, I tried to warm up on the rotted, jury-rigged-reed clarinet. ?The plant’s leaf disintegrated, and when the VP got back, I asked him where I might get a reed. ?Looking terribly disppointed, he said that we didn’t have time for that and that I should just go ahead and eat something. ?I turned around, and all the food was gone.
Then I went into the banquet hall’s bathroom, and Micah walked in. ?I asked him how he got all the way out to Franklin Springs, but before he answered, the alarm went off.
Nate,
I can totally relate. The number and intensity of these “anxiety” dreams were noticeably higher the last few months as I was in the process of completing my dissertation (I finally deposited it into the library last Friday!). Strangely, even though I haven’t had classes for a couple years now, most of these anxiety dreams had to do with classwork in some way. Often, in these dreams, I would be amazed to discover that I had a final for a class coming up that I didn’t even remember enrolling in, and that I would have to drop working on my dissertation to study for said final. Another dream I had the other night, *after* I had finally completed the requirements for the Ph.D., involved finding out that I wasn’t done after all, and in fact had to enroll in another semester of classes. I guess I’ve been in school so long that my brain refuses to give up that paradigm. Maybe it’s a good thing, since I plan on being a teacher myself.