I dreamt I was in one corner of a busy con suite, banging away at a toy typewriter while Bill Shunn watched me and other writers waited their turn to use it. It was a pretty crappy toy typewriter, plastic instead of metal. The keys were of a solid piece with the body, so that they didn’t move when you hit them. The platen was fused into the rest of the machine so that it didn’t return, and there wasn’t even room to fit in a sheet of paper. So it almost looked like a fake you’d find in a furniture store to stand in for a real typewriter in a pretend office.

Bill asked me whether I wasn’t wasting my time banging away at a machine like that.

And I told him no, not really. It didn’t matter whether I was leaving any evidence of what I was writing there in front of us, because I knew that whether or not I had a record, somewhere in the world, someone I didn’t know was seeing my words appear in front of them. That was all that mattered. And I went back to typing.

Now there’s a dream that’s easy to interpret!

A note about my dreams in general, for those of you who follow them: When I wake from a dream in the middle of the night, I’ll scribble down a few words, sometimes only two or three, as a tickler. For example, with this dream, I scrawled, “Bill Shunn waste time plastic toy platen.” Then I’ll go back to sleep. And when I wake, I sometimes don’t even remember whether I’d had a dream or not. Until I look at the notepad. And when I read those few words, the entire dream comes rushing back.

Is it that way for any of you?

I have quite a vivid dream life, usually remembering two-three dreams each night. I’ve been sharing the ones that can be explained briefly both on twitter and facebook.

But since twitter is ephemeral, I thought I’d gather my tweet dreams together in one place, both out of a fear that they might fade, and to see if there’s any overarching theme. So here are three months worth of them in reverse chronological order. I already knew that many of you in the science fiction, fantasy, and horror communities had starring roles in my dreams. But what I didn’t realize was how many of the dreams I’d already forgotten.

Looking at these, I have a feeling that I’ll someday do something more formal with them. But for now, just seeing them in one place is satisfying enough.

Welcome to my subconscious!

I dreamt I was in a railway station discussing the print histories of Dune and LOTR with Cheryl Morgan as ancient steam engines roared by. 7:41 AM Dec 31st, 2009

I can’t believe I dreamt I was driving while explaining SCI FI Wire’s Moveable Type system to my bored passengers. I need to get out more. 8:10 AM Dec 30th, 2009

I dreamt I was at an awards banquet, polling my friends as to whether or not I should shave my head. But I woke while tallying the votes! 7:56 AM Dec 29th, 2009

I dreamt I was reading the nonexistent The Complete Jules Feiffer, which contained thumbnails for comics I _know_ he had nothing to do with. 7:57 AM Dec 28th, 2009

I dreamt I could play the guitar, but when I tried to sing along, I couldn’t recall the lyrics to a single song. But the music was amazing. 8:38 AM Dec 27th, 2009

I dreamt I was at a con dinner for ten (including Jenn Reese and Karen Meisner) in Australia. A ladybug crawled on Karen, who didn’t mind. 8:26 AM Dec 25th, 2009

I dreamt I was in a corrupt Third World country trying (and failing) to convince rebel leaders to cooperate with the church, and vice versa. 8:20 AM Dec 25th, 2009

I dreamt that a strange insect, half stick bug, half praying mantis, had gotten into the house, and we were having a staring contest. I won. 7:35 AM Dec 24th, 2009

I dreamt I was visiting with Paul Di Filippo and preparing to eat at Prosciutto’s, an all-prosciutto restaurant that exists only in dream. 7:33 AM Dec 24th, 2009

I dreamt I was wandering NY with Irene Gallo while describing the new mag I intended to publish, one with a different format for each issue. 7:29 AM Dec 24th, 2009 (more…)

I can remember three dreams from last night/ this morning, all of them having some connection to my family. Which makes sense, considering I spent the weekend in Florida due to the unveiling of my father’s grave marker.

In the first dream, I was driving along in my Jeep at high speed, trying to keep up with a pterodactyl that was flying alongside me. For some reason, I was attempting to place a colander on its head like a hat. I kept almost getting it, but after multiple tries, the thing grabbed it in its mouth and dropped it to the ground. The whole time this was going on, my mother was continually telling me I was doing it wrong.

In the second dream, I was in some sort of Biggest Loser-like reality show, which now that I’m awake I can’t really understand, since in real life I’m in no shape to be eligible for such show. But in the dream it made sense. I noticed one of the other contestants carrying a wad of cash, and I realized she was taking bets from the other participants as to which of us would be tossed off the show that week. I called her on it, said she shouldn’t be doing it, that she should be thrown off the show, that I was going public with the info. As a result, I was visited by the guy in charge of the show, who in the dream was being played by a rather menacing … Harvey Keitel. He wanted to know why I’d want to make trouble for his show, and I explained why I was so offended, which included me telling him that perhaps I was sensitized to the issue because of having grown up with my grandfather the bookie (about whom many stories were told during my real life post-cemetery weekend). I woke while making my case, so the dream never arrived at any conclusion.

In the final dream before waking, I had been asked for some reason to appear in a play at a school for young kids. I was to perform as the Hunter in “Little Red Riding Hood.” The Wolf was going to be played by Robert DeNiro. The dream mostly took place in my home as I was choosing what clothes to wear for the performance. My mom asked me where the play was going to be performed, and I began to tell her, but when I realized she wanted to sneak into the school without an invitation, I stopped in middle of reciting the address.

It seems that though I’m home in West Virginia, my subconscious is still back in Florida.

I dreamt that I came downstairs within my actual house and stepped into my actual kitchen (not a common occurrence in my dreams, as they so often take place in previous houses or apartments or in residences I’ve never seen in real life but am not surprised to be living at in dream) into an extremely sunny kitchen. Irene is sitting directly under one of the skylights, ablaze in a beam of sunshine. I tell her that I’d just that moment received an e-mail from Marvel Comics hiring me to work as a proofreader for a week. She seems a bit puzzled, and it’s only when I see her expression that I am, too, for it’s only in that instant that I think—how exactly as I supposed to be commuting each day from West Virginia to Manhattan? Or if I stay in a hotel, won’t that cost more than I’ll earn? That issue arose as if I’d never thought of it before, and trying to figure out how the job was supposed to work, I woke. I’m often thrust from dreams when I realize that there’s something I haven’t realized before.

I also dreamed that I was giving a symposium on how to get published, not at a science-fiction convention, but on a college campus. I’m standing in front of an audience in an auditorium and rattling off markets. When I try to tell them about a writer who’ll be editing three themed anthologies, his name escapes me, and as I stand up there saying things like, “oh, you know who I’m talking about,” all I can remember is the name of his son, and so I say that it’s River’s dad, and then his name comes back to me—Tim Pratt. Now in real life, Tim isn’t editing anything fiction-related (as far as I know), so don’t start sending him your manuscripts! But in the dream, he was. And as those in the audience scribbled down the information, I moved on to other actual markets.

And still I continued to dream, though I’m not sure whether the next scene can be considered an entirely new dream or an extension of that second one …

I was hanging with Paul Di Filippo on a college campus, each of us stretched out on different couches on the first floor of a massive dormitory. And as we lounged there, for some reason I was thinking of what would happen if the building with its hundreds if not thousands of students were to be cut off from the rest of the world. I suggested that everything would soon turn all Lord of the Flies inside.

“Nah,” he said laconically, and with a smile. “I’m sure everything would be all right.”

“Why?” I asked. “Is that because people from Rhode Island don’t ever go all Lord of the Flies?”

Which is the first time I realize that the campus is in Rhode Island. I don’t hear Paul’s answer, because then I wake.

In the night’s final remembered dream, Maureen McHugh steps up to me carrying a baby. In the dream, it seems to be hers. She sits down, and then I suddenly notice Ellen Datlow is also there, and instead of any of us ever saying anything, we instead watch as Maureen feeds the baby Cheerios, because all we’re capable of is oohing and aahing over the cutie pie.

And then I wake for the final time and put an end to dream.

I dreamt that I was talking on the phone with Stephen Segal, who in the dream had nothing to do with Weird Tales, but was now in charge of editing and publishing Locus. I was explaining the details of the current Harlequin Horizons vanity publishing fiasco, and he told me that he wanted me to write an article about it for him—and he wanted me to write it the same way the late Charles Brown would have. But that wasn’t the oddest thing about the dream. No, what was oddest was that I was wearing a bracelet made of Spanish olives. Not wax ones. Real ones. A ring of small pimento-stuffed olives was looped around my right wrist. I can understand why I might have been dreaming about Stephen—he’d sent me an e-mail a couple of days ago inviting me to a steampunk event in Frederick, MD. But where did the olives come from?

Then I had a dream in which Irene and I were moving from our current house and I was doing the final packing of last-minute forgotten items before I’d pile the boxes in the car and drive off. I was wrapping up things like extension cords and putting them in boxes by the back door. Only I had no idea where we were moving to. And, hard as it is to believe, I had no emotions one way or another about the move. I woke up, turned over, and went back to sleep, and then there we were outside of our new home, some urban apartment building. I had no idea in what city it was located, I just picked up a broom and started sweeping up all the broken glass from the street out front so we could begin moving in. I woke, still sweeping.

And then I also had a dream in which I was in a meeting with the cast of Mad Men, plotting an ad campaign. As we discussed a commercial, I wasn’t any of the characters, I was actually me, as if I’d happened to get a job there. Everyone seemed to be getting along, which was strange, if you’ve seen the show. Don Draper was actually smiling! The other strange thing? Peggy Olson was wearing a see-through blouse. Don was bemused about it, but no one told her to change. There wasn’t anything sexual about it. It was more of an “I am woman, hear me roar” ’60s moment, with Peggy expressing her independence. Thinking about her character now that I’m awake, I doubt she’d ever do such a thing. But I do see her going boldly into the ’60s in other ways as the series moves forward.

So—three remembered dreams from the night, but only one with an apparent catalyst. Who ever knows where these things come from?

I dreamt this morning about my father, who passed away in January. Perhaps he was in my mind because I’ll be heading to Florida next month for the unveiling of his grave marker. I’m not sure of the reason, because the dream wasn’t about his death. Actually, the dream didn’t seem to be about much of anything.

Irene and my son and I were visiting my parents in Florida. We were driving to some local tourist trap, but I wasn’t yet aware what it was. At the door, I showed my tickets, but 1) my Mom wasn’t there, at least momentarily, visiting the rest room or something, 2) I had many more tickets than were actually necessary for us to enter, which had to be sorted out, and 3) a young boy whom I did not know was with us, who couldn’t have been a stand-in for my son, since my son was there at his current age. Not sure what significance any of that had. After I handed in the correct number of tickets and the boy wandered off, we went inside.

It turned out that we were visiting a farm, and as the crowd of tourists gathered in the farmhouse living room, the farmer explained the basics of how they harvest, make bread, etc., which I found irritating, since I’m surrounded by farmers in real-life. I have been both here and in our previous home in Maryland, so for at least 20 years, I’ve found nothing touristy about visiting a farm. Those are simply our neighbors, doing their daily work. If I wanted to visit a farm, I could just walk down the street. So I kept thinking, why would anyone think Irene and I would find this experience new and different? (more…)

I had a rather strange dream last night. Not strange when considered against the weirdness of the other dreams I’ve been reporting here, but strange for a non-religious heathen such as myself to have. I was wandering a totalitarian regime in which religion was illegal, and came upon an immense crowd protesting at a gated government building for the right to practice their beliefs. My response to this? I began performing communion.

I walked though the crowd carrying a single loaf of bread, ripping off small pieces, handing them out, telling people to eat. As I did this, managing to press the bread into the hands of hundreds, the loaf never diminished. I kept expecting the entire time that soldiers would come pouring out of the building and drag me away. Well, something must have happened, only I don’t know exactly what it was, because the dream jumped to after whatever happened happened, and I was suddenly within the building, suffering the consequences of my actions.

I was now locked away in a small cell, and about to be visited by the U.S. ambassador, so there was a glimmer of hope. Maybe I’d get released. Unfortunately, when the door swung open and the U.S. ambassador entered, he was the character of Murray from Flight of the Conchords, about as inept a helper as you’d ever want. I have no idea why a character who in the series is an attache for the New Zealand consulate was yanked from my subconscious to be cast as a U.S. ambassador, but there you have it.

My heart sank, figuring this meant I’d be trapped there forever, and I woke.

I dreamt last night that Irene and I were moving back to New York. (Yeah, right, like that’s ever going to happen.) We were moving to an apartment in Times Square. (Yeah, right, like we could ever afford that even if it was going to happen.)

In the dream, I was wandering the first floor of the chosen apartment building, which was being used as a dance studio, with many people leaping around in leotards in time to piano music. I wandered the immense room until I finally found the doorway which opened on the stairs which led up to our apartment.

I unloaded the first box of books from the Jeep we’d parked on the street and carried it upstairs. As I came back down for the next box, who should I find at the foot of the stairs, each lugging a box to help me move in, but Stephen King and Ray Bradbury! And even though Bradbury appeared to be the same age as when last I’d seen him, he was on his feet, full of strength, no longer wheelchair bound. Both men were smiling, laughing, jovial. They’d happened to bump into Irene standing by the car full of boxes, and wanted to help.

The next thing I remember, we were done, all unpacked. And as I looked around the apartment, trying to recall which room I’d chosen to use as my office, I wondered how we had gotten there. I couldn’t remember why we’d moved back, what the motivating factor had been. And in the dream, we’d only been gone from the city five years, not 24 as in real life.

“Exactly why are we here again?” I kept asking Irene, confused, trying to figure out why we’d decided to return. When I looked out the window, I could see that our apartment was no longer in the Times Square area, but instead in Coney Island. I could see the Cyclone roller coaster, the parachute jump. But that didn’t give me any answers. I woke, never having any idea what had caused me to return.

I dreamt that I was hanging out at the beach with coworkers in a gathering meant to induce bonding. I’m not sure how much bonding was going on, though, as I couldn’t even tell the identities of the coworkers who were with me. What office were they supposed to represent? Were these comrades from my current job at Syfy, or were they from past employers Sovereign Media or Marvel Comics? I couldn’t tell. As we milled around in the sand, it was one big faceless mob.

Then the boss stepped forward with a surprise. Two surprises, actually. The first surprise was that as soon as he started speaking, I recognized him. It was Steve Carell, in his role of the not-so-bright boss of The Office. (My coworkers remained anonymous after this big reveal, though, and did not suddenly turn into other Office cast members.) Surprise number two was his announcement that as an additional part of our supposed bonding, we were all about to go skydiving together.

My boss began climbing into his chute, and as he wrapped the straps around himself, he tripped and fell, bumping into a trash can in which a fire was going to keep us all warm. The can tipped over onto him, and his hair caught fire. No one else seemed to be doing anything as he screamed, but I scooped him up in my arms and, since we were at the beach, ran into the ocean to submerge him in water. (Though thinking about it now, awake, I’m not entirely sure that was such a good idea. What would salt water do to his burns? Maybe I should have covered him in sand instead.)

Suddenly, it’s months later. As a result of what happened at the beach—and I’m not sure whether this resulted as a reward for rescuing my boss or merely because an opportunity arose because my boss was dead or incapacitated as a result of the fire—I’m writing a massive issue of a Marvel comic in which the Hulk fights the Thing.

I’m doing it in a hotel room for some reason, my wife beside me. When I step into the hallway, there’s John Verpoorten, longtime Marvel Comics production manager (who’s long gone from the real world). He’s worried about my progress. Will I be able to get it done in time? I didn’t mind him asking, because it was his job to worry. I told him this would be easy for me, that I’d been reading stories of the Hulk fighting the Thing since I was a kid, so their rivalry was in my blood. It was going to be a snap.

I woke while continuing to reassure him in that hotel hallway, both of us smiling.

I dreamt this morning that I was visiting with Tony Isabella, a comic book writer and editor I first met a very long time ago. To give you some idea as to how long, I’d never have gotten my job at Marvel Comics without him. (There we are below in a Marie Severin caricature originally published in an ancient issue of Marvel’s fan magazine FOOM.)

In the dream, I was hanging with him in a hotel room, where we were accompanied by a couple of PR flacks I’d never met before. We chatted for awhile, catching up, and then Tony playfully said, “Hmmm … I wonder where I’m going to find someone to finish this aliens story I don’t have time to write?” Which was his way of asking whether I would take over a project he couldn’t complete.

I told him it sounded good to me, and then those corporate types jumped in, clarifying with the details. It seems I’d misinterpreted when Tony had spoken of lower-case “aliens,” because this was no tale of random aliens I was needed to tell, but rather some sort of continuation of the film Aliens. For some reason, they also thought it important to mention that there be no music in whatever I wrote, that these aliens did not have that art form. Since it had never occurred to that they would, that didn’t bother me.

The dream ended with Tony and me sitting and talking, just two old friends who haven’t seen each other in an awfully long time filling in the missing years.

In a later dream, I was in a phone conversation with Michael Dirda while he was in Cambridge and I was at home, and I was recommending what bookstores he should visit while there … as if Michael would ever need advice from me on where the best bookstores are!