Secret Studio

Once again,
I had a dream about a secret room.

This secret room was at church.
It was a secret recording studio.

In real life,
the church in my dream
does have a recording studio.
But it's not "secret."
In fact,
in real life,
many have recorded there.

But in my dream,
the secret studio was actually
in the sactuary area.
It was secret in that only a very few
knew that it existed.
And yet,
it was right in front of their noses
just above the sactuary.

From inside the studio
you could see the entire enterior of the church.
It was all windows, large plates of glass.
How it was that you could see out
but people in the church couldn't see in
I do not know.

The technology was just fabulous!
Something as simple as
burning a copy of a CD was amazing.
You could take an ordinary CD
and just copy what music you wanted.
For example,
instead of copying all of the music,
you could just copy the guitar part.
The program would just remove
the other music for you.

And the room itself was pristine.
Clean.
Well cared for.
Those who knew this room existed
obviously took great care of this space.

How it is that I was invited
to know about this room
I don't know.
But somehow,
for some reason,
I was one of the chosen musicians
who able to share in this sacred space.

NOTE:
That I dream a bit about churches
is no surprise as in my waking world
I work for a church.
In fact, I work part-time
for three different churches.
But what does all of this dreaming
about secret rooms mean?
What's the secret?
What's the room?
Where's the room?

Trip Up North

I had a dream that I was going up north
With several of my friends.
We were discussing which of us would drive
And then decided that we could all go in one car.

I don’t know why,
But everyone was dressed very nicely.
This was odd
As this was going to be long weekend,
Sort like a camping event,
though we would be staying in a hotel.
Most of the events we were going to attend
Would be outside activities.
And yet,
Everyone arrived ready to leave
In very nice attire.

My friend, Marcy,
Was wearing black pants
With a red and white blouse
That had spaghetti straps.
Dolores was dressed in black pants
With a black suit jacket.

When we got into the car
I ended up in the back seat
With two other friends.
There were actually four seated in front.
Lupe was driving,
Though in real life Lupe is already deceased.

During the drive up
We were discussing the talks
That each of us would have to give.. .
. . .some sort of testimony.
The plan was that everyone in attendance would speak.
After each talk,
A flag of some sort was placed
In a design.
The flags for our group were red and white.

When we arrived,
I decided to go for a walk.
One of my friends was with me.
A child started to follow us.
She wanted to warn us about something,
But I don’t know what.
She continued to follow us,
Though remaining behind us some distance.
As we neared a railroad track
We decided to return to the group.

On Sunday we went to church.
The priest had invited several couples
Who had lost a child.
They all came, but were seated, each couple, alone.
No one from the congregation had welcomed them
Or greeted them when they came in.
After church,
They were going to have
Some sort of support group for them.

I approached the priest
And told him that I thought
That each couple should have
Some sort of sponsor couple from the parish.
Not so much to be a part of the support group,
Though I thought that was a good idea.
But mainly to befriend them
And welcome them to our church. .
. . .introduce them to others,
attend church functions with them. . .
. . .basically spend time with them
until they knew some members of the congregation.
The priest decided that mine
Was a bad idea.

After all of this at church,
We went back to all of our activities of the weekend.
More people gave talks
And different colors of flags
Were placed in the design.

Trapped in the Choir Room

I fell asleep this afternoon.
And, as things would have it,
I had another dream!

I dreamt that I was on my way
to choir rehearsal.
(I do sing in the choir
in my awake life.)

Ruben was leading the rehearsal.
Ruben was a very talented guitarist.
In actuality,
he died awhile ago.

Anyway,
Ruben was leading the rehearsal.
Really, it wasn't so much a rehearsal
as a run through of things
before worship.
I was running late.
As I arrived
things were just finishing up.

Everyone was leaving,
but I sat down
to get my music in order
after having received the song list from Ruben.

It was a larger rehearsal room.
I think it was underneath the church,
Like a basement social hall or something.
It definitely was on a lower level.
Except it wasn't a hall
it was clearly a music room. . .
. . music stands, choral seating,
piano, etc.

Everyone had left
and then I heard someone calling.
She was on the floor above,
but not in the church.
She tried to come down through the elevator
but something happened.
A myriad of plastic toys
had gotten in the way
in the elevator shaft.
The elevator couldn't come all the way down.
I told her to try to go back up
and come down the elevator
on the others side of the building.

And then I walked around
to where the other elevator was.
The doors suddenly burst open
and tons and tons and tons
of plastic toys came spilling out.

She eventually made it to the music room
via a stairwell.
It really was more like a fire escape,
except that it was in the building.
It was very narrow
and you had to pull the stairs down
in order to use them.
We didn't know where all the toys came from.

So,
what does this mean?
This is the second time today
that I dreamt of someone
who has already passed on.
What does that mean?
What does the elevator mean?
And an elevator going down???
Plastic toys?

Selling the Basilica

A rather strange dream last night. . .

. . .I dreamt that the church
(The Roman Catholic Church, that is )
was in dire need of financial help.

The church decided
that it was going to sell off a lot of her buildings.
This included selling
St. Peter's Basilica in Rome.

I protested the sale of the Basilica.
While I could understand
selling some of the Catholic school buildings
that were no longer in use,
or other buildings,
I could not understand selling The Basilica.
The Basilica is an historic treasure,
not just for Catholics
but for many people.
I tried to explain this
to church leaders,
but they continued with the plan nontheless.

The church also decided to sell off
all of the rectories.
The parish priests were relocated
to much smaller housing.
The houses were one room homes,
with a very small driveway to park their cars.
It was basically a bed and a bathroom.

All of the priests in a geographical area
(not sure how large the area was)
would have a community building
where they would have their meals
and watch TV and just hang out.
The idea the church had was to
bring the priests back into
a life of community relationship with each other.

In my dream,
I decided to live in one of these house.
I dressed it up very nicely with curtains.
And I planted all sorts of flowers outside.
My house was way better than all of the others.
I was trying to show the priests
who were not keen on the idea
of living in these small houses
that they could be made quite comfortable
and homey.

In the end,
the small houses became quite popular
with single people.
Married couples without children
and older couples with grown children
also liked these one room houses.
And the neighborhoods
all shared the TV room and
had meals together in the community house.
People took care of each other
but still had their privacy.

Church, School and The Little Boy

OK. . .
. . . last night's dream had way too many things going on. . .

First off,
I dreamt I was driving the car,
on my way to church.
It was raining.
I saw a man from my church walking,
so I offered him a ride.

The front passenger seat was all pushed foward
and leaning in,
so he had to adjust it to get in.

When we arrived at church,
it was really a school.
He walked in
and I never saw him again from that point on.

A number of young girls came up to me
and greeted me, hugging me.
I remember thinking
that I didn't have a clue
as to who these girls were.

A teacher, actually I think she was a coach of some sort,
wanted to show me something.
I think some sort of new design
for the cheerleaders uniform.
One of the parents had designed it.
After I looked at it,
I went into the church. . . .
. . again, I know it was a church,
but in my dream it was like a school.

I sat near an Asian family with several children.
The youngest child was very active
and kept talking to me very playfully.
Somehow, I had the idea
that even though I had never met this family before,
they were, somehow,
my own family.

Later,
I was walking around the building,
I saw my mother having lunch
with another woman who in real life is deceased.
I remember telling her that she had to see the child,
especially since she was with her friend.
I took the ladies over to where the family was
that I sat near during church.
She marvelled at how the little boy was growing up so fast.
. . this seemed odd.
Somehow,
this family was my family
even though I had never seen them before this day.

The Movie Maker

Last night,
I had a dream that I was movie maker.
Not sure if that meant
I was a producer or director
or screen play writer.
I only know that I made movies.

I was holding a preview
of some new movies I had just made.
A few short movies,
and one full length documentary film.

Many were invited to attend.
Friends and family. . .
. . and some not so friendly,
those who would prove to play the role of "foe"
in the documentary.

I think there were three short films.
While I don't recall what the others were about,
one of the films was about the flag.
It detailed what the colors
and symbols mean.
In my dream,
I remember feeling like
so many people just don't have a clue
as what symbols are,
as to what power symbols can have.
I think using the flag to explain the power of symbol
was only a prelude
to the symbols that would be found
in the documentary.

The documentary, however, was a bit difficult.
It detailed a real life situation
of a man who overcame many obstacles
to get where he is today.
And many who created those obstacles
were there watching the film.

There were also many in attendance
who had absolutely no idea
what this man overcame... not a clue.
Impressed by his story,
they began to ask him questions after the film was over.

Needless to say,
those who gave him grief
tried to defend their actions,
saying that he deserved to be treated in such a fashion,
that it was for is own good
and development.

Yet, the people seemed to support this man.
It's like,
they had an entirely new respect for him
and for those like him,
living through similar circumstances.

The man in my dream
was a Roman Catholic Priest
who was pushed out of public ministry
by leadership
who tried to impose
the rule of obedience
in nonsensical ways,
in ludicrous ways.
He began to be treated badly by leadership
when he began questioning injustice
within his group.

The movie detailed how he was still
very much involved in a public ministry,
though no longer in a formal way with the church.

The people in my dream
wanted very much for him
to return to a formal public minstry,
though they realized that this would not be possible
with the current rules and regulations of the church.

Those who pushed him out of ministry
continued to defend their actions
and their motives.

No formal decisions were made.
The man didn't decide
to try and persue a formal public ministry.
The people didn't decide
to make noise about it.
The church leaders who gave him grief
didn't decide to keep an eye on him.

But it was obvious that the movie
struck a nerve with all present.
And that no one in attendance
would ever see things the same way.