What Dreams May Come

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Where do I start?

Perhaps with this morning’s dream. It was a sluggish start for me. I kept on hitting the “snooze” button on my phone. Most days I wake up just before the alarm first goes off. I did this morning as well, but was just only conscious enough to grab my phone off the floor beside my bed and place it on the pillow near my head to be within finger placement for tapping “snooze”. This happened several times (my tapping “snooze” I mean). There is a five minute gap between snooze alerts. When I am particularly sluggish in the morning, that five minutes is more than enough time for me to drift back off to sleep. The snooze will trigger only so many times before it stops completely.

On my penultimate snooze, I drifted into a sleep and a dream. And who should be in this dream but…Mr Kerr. It’s been quite a while since I had a dream featuring him. And it seemed to be a complete happenstance that I was where I was and he was where he was in this dream. A rather nondescript locale that I didn’t recognise. An amalgam of various places.

Jim was sitting on a bench, by a roadside. There was a free seat next to him on his right. I can’t really remember now if he saw or noticed me approaching or not. Perhaps he did. If he did, I’m not sure he let on much that he had done so. 

I sit down. He looks over at me. “Hello”, I say, “how are you?” With a broadening smile he says “Great. I’m just great.” I’m sure there was a little more to the conversation after that. Not much. And nothing I actually recall. Jim was all the time smiling – that content slightly smug look he gets sometimes – looking wistfully ahead of him. Now and then he’d look back at me (no doubt thinking, “are you STILL here, wumman?” Lol) and smile more broadly.

He was wearing a lightweight long sleeve jacket, and he had his hands inside the opposite sleeve, using the sleeves of the jacket as a “muff”, if you will (bites tongue til it bleeds! Lol). I didn’t think I was sitting quite that close to him, but at one point the right sleeve with his left hand inside of it brushed against me. Brushed? I’m not sure. I think he might have deliberately reached out for my arm. Anyway, I was a little startled and a little electrified by the “accidental brush” in equal measure. He saw my visible reaction to it and feigned mild shock and was then slightly apologetic in mannerism. He then made a joke of it by reaching out at the guy sitting next to him on his left, which in turn startled that guy. Jim and I looked at each other and giggled and then ….. SNOOZE ALARM!

I never try to analyse or interpret dreams too much. I just see dreams as the mind’s television. It’s all full of folly. I never go all Freud and Jung on them. They are what they are. Who knows what machinations the subconscious is up to? But if I were to try and decipher it? Well…it had a warmth to it. It felt lovely. For a change I actually felt liked. So do I take it that I have this whole “Jim hates me and can’t stand to be near me” hang-up all wrong? Is it my subconscious saying to me “You’ve got it all wrong, girl! He likes you. STOP WORRYING!” Or, are my dreams and subconscious as deluded as I am?

Deeper analysis aside – it was a lovely yet rather fleeting dream.

And I still have yesterday to talk about yet. More to come on that, but first I must get some study done!

Minds Music Monday – Sleeping Girl

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UPDATE: 8th Dec, 2021. This post has been edited from the previous posted version.

A “modern” enigma this song is for me. I have placed the word “modern” in quotation marks as the song is now almost 20 years old which for me brings it into the more recent Simple Minds bracket. Anything pre-2001 is “old” Minds. Anything post-2001 is modern Minds.

Usually I am happy for the ambiguity to remain with a Simple Minds track. I love that Jim’s lyrics are open to interpretation and that songs very obviously mean different things to different people, but we unite in the acknowledgement and agreement that this band is like no other for us. 

I don’t want to get bogged down in the mire of what I think of the Cry album in general. Suffice it to say I think it rings very true to where the band found themselves at the turn of the millennium. Set adrift. To use an old adage “up shit creek without a paddle”. Cry is a metaphorical “life raft”. It helps them out but it doesn’t quite get them to shore – not for me personally anyway. It’s only my opinion and feeling, of course.

There are things that keep them afloat, for sure. For me, the absolute pinnacle of the album is Spaceface. I will never have a bad word said against that song. Ever! This song dragged me out of such dark places time and again.

Disconnected does a similar thing. It wasn’t a song I warmed to initially but that soon changed. And it is amazing how that can happen. But I think the days of a “change of heart” with a song are now gone. I like what I like now when it comes to Simple Minds’ output pretty solidly. 

Recently I have grown tired of certain songs and they have been on a listening break for a while. In fact, dare I say the whole of Once Upon A Time is on a listening hiatus for me as I feel genuinely “overexposed” to it all now.

I also don’t listen to the whole Cry album because of my “prejudice”. This reminds me of my exchange with Jim about David Bowie’s Heathen album. I guess Cry is my Heathen, eh, Jim? From memory I think you said you liked “Everyone Says Hi” from Heathen, but little else? (I talk as if he is reading this. Lol. Sooooo deluded!) Well, I guess that’s me with Cry and Spaceface (and Disconnected and Sleeping Girl). 

Back to Sleeping Girl itself and the ambiguity of the lyrics. On Dream Giver there is only an attempted transcript of lyrics as none have actually been published. I kind of like that Jim tends to not want his lyrics published. I understand the reason behind why he doesn’t – if he still holds firm in the belief and justification he had in them not being printed in early SM days “they go with the music”, ie: he felt to single them out by printing them would turn them into poetry and separate them from the music. That’s fair enough. But conversely, you write the lyrics because you love words. They ARE meant to mean something. Not just to be heard merely as music, with music. If so, then you might as well sing in “vocalise”. Jim’s feeling on this must have changed by the mid 1980s because we wouldn’t have the lyrics we have on Street Fighting Years if he didn’t want his lyrics to say something. To have meaning. For people to find a meaning and definition to them.

I like that Sleeping Girl is mystical. What exactly is going on in that song? What is this “violation” Jim talks about? Are we meant to interpret that observing a “sleeping girl” without her knowledge is therefore a “perverse” act and in turn a “violation”? 

I had recently been in conversation with a friend about observing someone in sleep. The beauty of it. The beauty of the sleeper. We are at our most vulnerable during our sleep. I think that vulnerability plays on the waking mind a lot. I will be very open here about something that happened to me a lot during my teens and into my early 20s. I’m not sure how often these kind of dreams invade other womens sleep. It’s not something you find yourself discussing with your female friends. Well, I didn’t. One, I didn’t exactly have many friends. Two, how does one bring up this subject in conversation? 

The vulnerability of sleep meant that in my teens and into my 20s I often dreamed of being raped. (EDIT)

These days I just look at it objectively and think I was a raging, hormonal, sex-starved Scorpio (all those astrology things you read about Scorpios – take it from me, they aren’t overexaggerating the whole “lust” thing with our zodiac sign). 

(EDIT)

Anyway! I digress, some…

“Sleeping girl / I wish you could tell / this violation

Sleeping girl / I want you to smile / confirmation”

Is that – “I want you to feel or sense that I am watching you while you’re sleeping, and I want you to let me know that you feel it”? 

If so, then that’s goddamn fucking sexy! 

Also if so then it is very much on a par with the conversation I had with my friend about watching someone as they sleep and the feeling of the perverse that it triggers. You can’t help but feel you are invading someone’s vulnerability. 

Another friend I have spoken to more directly about the song in particular interprets the lyrics with a far more innocent view. I don’t know how they can view it quite so innocently given the language Jim uses in the lyrics. Perhaps it says as much about the dark recesses of my mind as it does about her more innocent interpretation? For I would hardly describe this friend as “innocent”, but perhaps a little more…restrained than myself when it comes to certain actions.

In summing up this overexposed Minds Music Monday, I find the song both musically and lyrically incredibly sexy. Vocally too. Those “Sprechstimme” lines Jim delivers as a kind of chorus – holy moly! *melts into a puddle*

Dream Within A Dream

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I had a mix of dreams this morning. Some were a little anxiety inducing. Others were just about all I dream of every day of my life.

I was sitting in a rather fantoosh looking kitchen…a kind of breakfast bar area of this kitchen. So…not in my house this place. I guess I was in his house/apartment? Or maybe it’s part of the hotel? There’s maybe some clue as to who my guest was (or more that I was HIS guest). Yes! I was dreaming that I was hanging out with Jim. Already I could just stop here and just be happy with this. That I was with him, being in his company.

I should have known INSTANTLY it was a dream because this will NEVER HAPPEN in real life. I feel as though I am the very LAST PERSON he’d ever want to spend time with, but in the dream he was happy. Relaxed and very smiley. And not the usual slightly arrogant and rather snidey Jim that I am faced with whenever I am in his presence. This time he was just happy to have me there with him and of course I was over the moon being there, and more relaxed than usual because I felt he was genuinely happy for me to be there with him.

And we were just sitting about talking.

It was a lovely sunny morning and the sunlight was streaming in. Some bits of the dream are a little sketchy. I’m not sure exactly what we had been talking about, or how we got to this subject but we were – well, he was initially – talking about Mel. He was reminiscing and being quite nostalgic. Saying how he had enjoyed having Mel working on Lostboy and that the tour was great. Then he said to me “I dreamed of him last night and when I opened my phone up this morning, his phone number appeared first.”

At this point in the dream I freaked out a bit because as I went on to tell Jim…. “OMG! That is really freaky! A similar thing happened to me last night. I was dreaming of Mel also and when I opened my phone this morning, the first thing I see is a photo of him!”

We both sat there smiling away in a strange kind of disbelief. Both a little astounded by our similar dreams. Just both of us kind of looking at each other a tad gobsmacked.

“You need to call him, Jim”, I say to him. “Do you talk to all the bands you’re fans of like this?”, he says back to me. “Lol, no”, I retort.

And then the dream ended. It was just very surreal and very lovely and I wish for all the world it was real. For all the world that Jim would actually WANT to sit around in a kitchen and just chat away with me and spend time with me. I honestly can’t think of anything more wonderful. Or anything that I want more in this world.

As soon as I “wakened up”, I started to hear the chords to this, because I had just experienced a “dream within a dream”….

It was Mel’s birthday yesterday….

I Miss Great Dreams And Great Hugs

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And at Bridlington, exactly five months after this post…the dream came true. Not exactly to the letter…but pretty darn near to! I was on his left side, he pulled me in and pulled me to his side. I was too scared to reciprocate and put my arms around him – as much as I would have died to have done it! But…I did rest my head on his chest which was…heaven…for the 10-15 seconds (rather than minutes) it lasted.

I miss hugs. I miss him.

Christmas Dreams

The Thread Of Memories

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So…my Facebook feed tonight threw this one up at me. A piece of poetry I wrote.

It was based on going out for a meal in Sydney’s northern suburbs with my sister to a place called Sambal.

There we are outside it. One of my favourite dishes is laksa and this place were doing a vegetarian laksa. I HAD to try it. It was bloody delicious!

Anyway. I found out about this place in the most unusual way. Jim had posted on the SM Facebook page about being a “domestic god” lol, and his like for sambal. I’d never heard of it! Looked it up on Google and it showed me this restaurant in Sydney among the search results. I replied to his post with all this – and this happened…

Obviously some time later I must have been reminded of the poem as several months later, I made this…and used the last line of the poem as part of the piece.

I thought of it all. Remembered it all just from seeing the poem in my “memories” earlier.

All these little insignificant things are all lovely little tokens for me. They’re all lovely little mementos of a special time.

Being home with mum. Feeling an affinity to Jim. Having a fun time with my sis. The art burgeoning and being special.

I guess it is one of my more “sycophancy Nancy” pieces. I had it printed years ago, and it’s still up on my wall now. I think it’s another of Sheila Rock’s. She always seemed to get him with his tits out. Lol

And the poetry? Well, it was all early days of my fandom. Been around barely a year. Had only just started to get snippets of interaction with Jim at that stage. Had only been to TWO Simple Minds gigs and was still another 18 months off meeting him.

I dreamed of him a lot back then.

A Brighter Day

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Today I awoke (or as Jim would say it, “wakened up”) and the sky was still in a deeper hue of dawn for a star to be visible. I wasn’t expecting that. It was quite bright too. Obviously. Bright enough for me to see it without any optical aid and in my ever fading dwam.

Although I know it wasn’t a shooting star, I wished upon it all the same.

“Star light, star bright / I’m the star you see tonight / And I wish I may, I wish I might / Be in your dreams tonight”

Today I feel a little brighter. The sky was brighter this morning, even if still in that deeper hue of dawn that it will be in until the clocks go back next weekend.

I am giggling at things and finding the funny side again.

Acceptance plays a big part in things. It’s that old adage – “(Insert your choice of deity here) grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.”

Basically, I’m trying to stop being a dumb fuck. Lol. In the meantime, I wanted to share this. I was taking a keek at the latest Uncut magazine when I didn’t quite take in the title of Elvis Costello’s new album. I’ll leave it to your imagination as to how I initially read it…

Back to the stars…

Minds Music Monday – Space – Johnson Somerset Mix

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I wanted to choose Space today because – I always wish to see Jim in my dreams. I spent the past few years before going to sleep, making that wish… “Please! When I go to sleep PLEASE let me dream about him. If I can’t get to be with him and spend time with him like I’d love to in real life, at least let me have it in my dreams. Please just let me dream of being with him!”

It rarely ever happened. And I honestly don’t know when the last time I dreamed about him was. I gave up asking. He’s as sick of me in my dwam state as he is in real life, it seems.

I don’t think I had ever heard this Johnson Somerest mix of Space before today. He always makes good mixes, some are naturally better than others, but I don’t think there has ever been one I haven’t liked.

Jim – I am trying to give you space, I really am. The last thing I have ever wanted is to bore you rigid. I fear that I have. So I am trying really hard to stop that from happening. But you post things and then…I just want to talk to you! And then I just pray that you’ll respond to me. Interact with me. Throw me a bone by responding to me.

And then I sound all super needy and clingy and I hate myself because I know that kind of stuff is stuff you detest. As I said before – to be enthusiastic is great, but to be OVER-enthusiastic is undesired.

Today is also the anniversary of something else that I don’t really want to think about or have happen ever, ever again. But it doesn’t stop me from living further back in the past. He started his post today with a quote from Kierkegaard …

Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forward

Soren Kierkegaard

I don’t feel like I live too much forward. I spend too much time in the past. Steeped in what feels like “halcyon days” when the art was good, when I felt like I was going somewhere, when I felt that affinity, though perhaps it was a dwam too?

GAH! I’m so sick of myself! No wonder he’s sick of me too! If I’m not living in the past, I just want to live in dreams…

Jim, Are You Not Entertained? Podcast Chat

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Jim posted about it yesterday, saying he was asked about Mandela.

It’s all well and good they were asking about Mandela Day. As you say, under current circumstances it makes sense.

But I still can’t help but feel pangs of envy. I mean, geez, it’s their SECOND interview in as many years and I can’t even get a look in!

And I know why. I get it. I am not deemed professional. My blog is just a “fan blog”. “Jim and Charlie don’t do blogs.” And I fancy the pants off you and adore you and I know doubt bore you to tears as well. And all that goes against me.

But! As a fan, I have questions. Rather different and specific ones. Not your usual “tell us the story about ‘dot dot dot’”. Maybe that’s what else goes against me also?

No. It’s just this…thing. This overriding feeling I get from you that I bore you rigid and you don’t really want to talk to me. I had my time and now I am “surplus to requirements”.

Man, I wish the shoe was on the other foot – or the feeling was mutual. Lol. But it isn’t. It never will be. I’ll ALWAYS want to talk to you, spend time with you, be near you. 😞😞😞

Anyways, here’s a link to the podcast. I’ve not listened to it yet. Or to the Jools thing yet. I’ll get round to it. When I have finished licking my wounds and wishing for things that will never be. (Reading certain passages of Lanark – man, I feel Alasdair Gray’s anguish over the opposite sex.)

 

https://ayne.podbean.com

(P.S. I nicked Sir’s selfie. Bite me, Kerr!)

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Tears For Tat?

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It was meant to be a play on words – “Tit for Tat” – but failed. Lol

This afternoon’s post about Elbow and Jamesie. The talk about “The Birds” making him cry. I could dream it was a response to my first “reply” playlist to him. My “Tears” playlist.

And he brings up birds. Surely he knows what I’m like with birds by now. The mere mention of them will set me off.

It had me thinking about Speirs Wharf and the sand martins.

Jamesie – the pheasant. Lol

Sweeties.

Oh, I have such dreams…

“What are we gonna do with you” … Larelle?

UPDATE: Oh, drats! It was Lippy Kids what made him cry. What do I know? Lol. I should learn to read!

What do I know? I know that no matter how present he feels, I still miss him. I still want to talk to him and feel close to him. That I am a clingy fucking fuckwit and I get angry with myself for being such a lovelorn idiot. 

That’s what I know.

”What are we gonna do with you, Larelle?”

Quit Dreaming…

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It has been playing on my mind so much lately, it was in my dreams this morning. I haven’t dreamed of him for some time.

The scenario was…backstage, at a soundcheck. Myself and a few other female fans. I’m unsure how I even got to be there given how the dream panned out.

He was being doted on and fussed over, and he was enjoying himself immensely, thank you very much. Until I said something and his face soured. I didn’t say anything particularly crass or dodgy or anything – but the look of disdain on his face was hard – well, impossible – for him to disguise.

And that was it. I out and out asked him “you really don’t like me very much, do you?” Nothing. He said nothing. Just a kind of shrug and a look that said “I have no words.”

One of the other ladies around says something to him and he smiles away and flirts with her. I respond. “See! This is the thing! Well, you could have at least sugar-coated it! …’Don’t be daft. Why would you think that?’ … Your silence tells me everything I need to know.”

“What do you want me to say?”, he says.

“Have I upset you? Tell me what it is.” I awoke before any answer was forthcoming. Would he have given one? [and an answer!! Boom boom! – yeah, I’m my own worst enemy and probably the reason he DOES hate my guts] Do I just take it that the answer will be “you’re too ‘in your face’. Too annoying, too demanding, too pestering, too…you”.

Yes. It’s only a dream. But apart from the scenario of being backstage, the rest of it felt very real. Lucid…

Was I upset in the dream? Of course! He was making no bones about how he was feeling about my presence there. I didn’t cry in his face. I try to possess some modicum of dignity – despite how it looks!

Have I awoken upset? Yes…probably much more so than I allowed him to see in the dream.

I wish it didn’t play on my mind so much. And I REALLY, REALLY WISH that I didn’t give two fucks. But I do.

I do.