Hanging out in the rest rooms.....

I’m sitting on the loo going off into a reverie about how much better American loos are than British ones when a small voice pipes up from the next cubicle.
‘I need to see your feet.’
Eh? My head snaps round like the girl in The Exorcist. Why does a small child want to see my feet? Then, halleluyah, an older voice (obviously, hopefully, her mother) replies.
‘I’m right here.’
‘I need to see your feet,’ the child repeats firmly. Clearly the kind who won’t be fobbed off in any way.
‘But I’m here. I’ll never leave you.’
It’s said with a kind of almost scary intensity. What’s the story, you wonder.
‘I need to see your feet.’
Oh for Pete’s sake, stick your foot under the door, lady. But no, the discussion continues.
‘You are my life.’
‘I NEED to see your feet.’
‘You are the reason I wake up in the morning.’
What’s this got to do with the poor child seeing her mother’s foot under the cubicle?
‘But I woke up before you.’
You’ve got to hand it to the kid. I couldn’t really hang around all day eavesdropping in (however entertaining) so I got up and the loo obligingly flushed for me (SO much more hygienic).

The major reason people come to Walt Disney World apparently is because they want to see their children having fun. Forget the scary brides and the college student get-togethers and the anniversary celebrations, it all makes a lot more sense when you focus on the children. When you travel without your own child, you become hyper-aware of other people’s and, on the whole, children here do seem to be having a ball. Even my cynical soul couldn’t argue with a child’s face lighting up when they see a favourite film come to life. So, OK, hands up, this was the day when I smiled.

I hate rollercoasters but I’m charmed by sweet pretty rides. So Peter Pan’s flight, where you float over London (with a very weird-looking Tower Bridge) and Neverland was very cute. Ditto It’s a Small World. James would have loved the Buzz Lightyear shoot-out ride while I was totally entranced by the Haunted House ride with pretty incredible visual effects – at one point you’re looking down onto a huge ballroom with holographic dancers – mesmeric.

The entertainment outside is impressive too. I jigged a bit to the Move It, Shake It, Celebrate It! Street party (yeah, thanks a bunch littlemummy for catching that on video) and oohed and aahed over the Wishes firework display (a little girl next to me nearly fell off her chair when Tinkerbell flew down from the Magic Castle. But the loveliest moment came during the SpectroMagic Parade (a sort of carnival with lit-up floats) when a little girl couldn’t believe her eyes when Snow White rushed over to her and planted a kiss on her cheek.
Pint-sized princesses wander around with tiaras and frothy dresses, having been ‘bibbidi bobbidi booed’ with a mini-makeover.

The sane cynical part of me says that this is all too unreal. Is this how it starts? How children grow up to become teenagers who think that they will walk straight into a job as a pop star, a model, a TV ‘celebrity’? That they can have everything they want with a snap of the fingers (and the flexing of a credit card)? Part of me still worries about a holiday in which nothing goes wrong – where there is no duff day when everyone gets bored and irritable and shouts at each other. When there’s no nasty waitress or rude beach attendant to bond you together in family hatred solidarity? Is this reality? No, of course not. But then, is it wrong to have a perfect holiday? Is it just my puritanical Britishness that thinks that a bit of grot, a bit of grim and grime, is character-building and necessary? Dunno.

Still, there is hope for Disney. When my supper at the Magical Kingdom comes, the whole shebang is stone cold. Fantastic. Excellent. Just what I needed to bring me back down to earth (I really was floating off for a moment there). Hmm, maybe Disney has researched this too and it was all planned. A little imperfection to highlight the general perfection? Am I getting paranoid here?

One about dreams

Dreams and portents. Dreams as portents. Last night I had the most horrific nightmares - of demon baby heads in boxes; of malevolent houses; of shit-smothered lavatories. Then again, like UPL, I often dream of horses – beautiful horses that I ride perfectly, seamlessly, like a centaur (exactly how I don’t ride in waking life). I’m forever revisiting old houses and those I’ve never been to. I’ve met Christ in a helicopter and flown with demons over urban parks. Sometimes it seems as I spend my entire nights dreaming – and half of my waking hours trying to puzzle out what they’re saying.
I’ve been intrigued by dreams all my life. The first one I remember was when I was about three. My mother had taken me to see the dinosaurs in Crystal Palace and, she swears, at the time I seemed quite sanguine about them. But that night I dreamed of a brontosaurus charging down our suburban garden and breaking in through the French doors. After that they turned really nasty – a black creature (half cat-half monster) stalked me throughout my childhood, my teens and my twenties. There would come a moment in the dream when I would realise, with horror, that the creature was there, waiting in the shadows, and that any moment it would fly at me, sinking its teeth in my wrist.
Sometimes, of course, dreams are just junk, the detritus of the day, anxieties and fears tumbling out. But some dreams, I know, have meaning. They are the big dreams, the important ones. I truly believe that dreams are the way our unconscious speaks to us.

There are many ways of working with dreams but I tend to paint mine. One of these days I will figure out how to get some of my images up on here so you can have a good laugh or shudder – they are a bit weird! I can’t scan them as they are usually huge. They may be a literal picture of what happened in the dream or they may be more of an expression of the mood of the dream through shape and colour.

The other thing I like to do is to “dream the dream on”, otherwise known as “active imagination”. If the dream ends on an uncertain or disconcerting note, you simply try continuing it in waking time. Imagine your dream in all its detail, not just visually but with all your senses, hearing the sounds, accessing the feeling in your body. There might be a character in the dream you want to question. If so simply ask the character if it would like to talk to you and then wait for the answer. Be patient: you have to wait for the answer and not rush to put something in. You will get a sense of when it's coming and it won't just be something your conscious mind is making up.

Generally the people or creatures you meet in dreams will tend to be different aspects of yourself, often those repressed in waking life. There are no hard and fast rules but here are a few that might have cropped up for some of you.

THE SHADOW: a dream character which normally manifests as someone of the same sex as yourself. Jung said it represents all the things about ourselves that we find unacceptable and so try to repress. Hence, if anger wasn't acceptable in your family as you grew up your shadow might appear as an angry or violent man or woman. If you can talk to your shadow and get on good terms, it will allow you to express your anger appropriately without flying off the handle. Ruthlessness is a common shadow for women because lots of little girls aren't allowed to be ruthless.
THE QUEEN: usually represents for a woman her own sovereignty and power. For a man it tends to represent his ability to deal with the feminine side of his nature.
ROCK STARS AND FILM STARS: generally represent the hero, excitement, creativity. Dreaming about a star means you want to project the part of you that craves attention and the centre-stage.
BABIES: Represent new life of all kinds. These dreams often come when you need to develop other sides of yourself - often when children have grown up and left home….
GOING TO THE LOO IN PUBLIC: Urinating in public usually represents spontaneous self-expression while defecating generally represents your creativity. Either dream usually means you haven't found your true way of expressing yourself.
BEING NAKED IN THE STREET: classically means a fear of revealing who you really are. Normally it will suggest that you need to reveal more of your true personality.
BEING CHASED: Usually whatever or whoever is chasing you is a part of yourself that wants to make contact with you. Animals can represent your instinctual nature - you may be leading too cerebral a life.
KILLING SOMEONE: A warning that you’ve tried to disown or failed to develop an important part of your own nature. Often this part of you contains your power, your strength – something you deny.

Sorry, I got a bit carried away there. Back in the real world, Adrian is in Lithuania. James is at school. I moved the wheelbarrow and the watering can and so the woodpecker has given up in disgust and gone back up the combe to hammer at trees (a far more suitable diet). I have finished the first draft of my ghosted book (hurrah!) and might even go to aerobics this morning. Thanks to everyone for your comments – I am continuing to be stern and steely to all concerned with the house (though so far they continue to ignore me totally!).

Aaaghh, all my pictures are on my laptop - so this will have to go picture-less for now.....imagine your own dream here!