Black Dreams Part 1

I had an off dream last night. That is to say, it was odd to me. People tell me that I have weird dreams because most of my dreams are stories and adventures spawned by the books I’ve read, the games I’ve played, and the stories I write. I have very lucid dreams where I switch perspectives between characters. The worlds are usually a fantasy setting over real life, but well constructed with normal physics and interactions. I don’t have those ambiguous, nonsensical dreams that I hear about from other people. I love my dreams, but this recent one I consider weird even by my standards.

Usually my dreams don’t get to an end before the alarm cuts in or my mother barges in, jarring sounds that drag me kicking and screaming out of bed. But this one… it did end. I can’t remember what it was about besides just a usual adventure but it has an end, happy I believe. After everything was resolved, the credits started to play. That alone was new. They just sped across my mind’s eye from the bottom to the top like the end of a movie but on hyper speed. This was a new facet to my dreams and I didn’t know what to make of it but before my sleeping self could think about it anymore, it got weirder.

In the middle of the credits, the screen turned off. It was reminiscent of the way old TVs turn off, when the screen squishes to the middle with a flash. The screen I am referring to is what you watch your dreams on, that stage inside your head where your brain entertains itself through the night. Well, mine just turned off leaving me in the dark. It wasn’t just dark; it was the absolute blackness of nothingness. I didn’t have any thoughts, images, words, or feelings float up to me in that darkness. It was like my brain had turned off, not just the dream. Nothingness…

I don’t know what roused me but I found myself waking up and rolling over and falling into another dream. Afterwards I reflected on it as the sensation of changing the channel, but I guess that doesn’t make sense if it was turned off. I don’t know, I definitely don’t understand. I am just writing it down as I remember, as it had felt. All I am sure about is that this dream has been the strangest one I’ve ever had and I don’t really want to experience that nothingness again. As a writer, my brain doesn’t shut up; it constantly spews out ideas, stories, plots, characters, and themes. It doesn’t turn off and go quiet. It’s not supposed to.