Category: Denise

(Sunday, August 13, 2017) third quarter moon Taurus / tarot maiden of cups – mermaid

Long dream of a dream conference, but only the ending remains.

The conference committee (Richard, Bob and the rest) have decided to create a theatrical dream piece. Regular IASD members, not staff or presenters, are tasked with acting out the play. I am pulled into the project very late. Everyone else is already in costume. In the dream I am aware of my extreme introversion. Maybe even on the Asberger’s spectrum.

My costume is a beautiful, sleeveless, ankle-length dress that is exactly tailored to embrace my lithe, healthy body. The color is deep sage green. It’s the same color I am painting my house in my shelter island dream. In that dream I call the color avocado, but sage is more accurate. Dreaming of a dress of this style is about being a mermaid, I believe. It is fitted all the way to my feet. Like soft skin. Like a fishtail.

I have to put on my costume in front of all the other actors, which terrifies me. Sensing my fear, a gentle, loving feminine spirit guide enters the rough, white muslin dress I am wearing and magically clothes me in the sage green mermaid dress. I am grateful not to have to be naked, exposed, in front of the extroverted theatrical types. Yet, I am in full, sensual appreciation of my elegant, perfect body, which is why I have been chosen for my part. I take off my muslin dress and lie in my mermaid dress on the stage floor with the full cast of the play.

We enact a scene of the play lying on the wooden floor. Almost like doing yoga together. The second act turns violent: the committee members pierce us with small, golden nails and begin an attempt to hammer them into our flesh more deeply. I seem to be the first to realize what is happening. The first to be aware of the attack.

Day notes:

The first mermaid dream I remember happened before the 2013 Virginia Beach conference. Yesterday was the deadly clash with the KKK and neo-Nazis in Charlottesville, Virginia. Demonstrations of this sort have a strong theatrical component. One night at the Virginia Beach hotel I was kept awake by a crowd of people in the hall that seemed to be speaking an African language. I wondered if it was an echo from the times the city was a capital for the slave trade. No one else heard what I heard. Like the ghosts at Rolduc Abbey.

I had dinner with Amy on Wednesday. We have known each other for 30 years. She made a comment that suggests she finds me somewhere on the Asberger’s spectrum. Is introvert different than Asberger’s? I don’t perceive myself as carrying any of those symptoms other than shyness and a sometimes hidden cleverness with geometry. But she works in special ed, so I give her benefit of the doubt. It doesn’t matter, really.

I reported a second predator incident to HR this week.

Three women in New York were murdered last night by a male family member who attacked them with a hammer.

(Sunday, August 6, 2017) full moon Aquarius / tarot three of cups / lunar eclipse tomorrow

This dream is nearly identical to my dream on July 21. The Sheehan family farm is up for sale. The asking price is $400,000. My heart is ecstatic at the opportunity to reclaim our ancestral lands. I can do this. I have the financial resources.

I am sitting next to my sister Jo in a pew at St. Mary’s Church in Minneiska, the church where my parents were married. My grandmother was a member of the congregation. We would also attend as children when we were at the farm. My sister wants to contribute to the purchase. I am full of joy and peace.

(Sunday, July 29, 2017) moon first quarter Scorpio / tarot seven of wands

This dream is opposite my two recent dreams of being complimented and supported by women who are spiritual teachers.

The dream feels like it lasts throughout the night, with many scenes that illustrate the same theme over and over.

It begins at a business conference. All of the executives, at least the ones that I work under, are women. I have submitted some of my design work to a contest that is being judged by the executives. I submit three designs, which I understand to be the contest requirement. But at the last minute the women change the rules. A fourth image is required, and I don’t receive this revision to the contest rules in time to make their deadline. I am deeply disappointed because I feel there was a strong likelihood I would have been named the winner. I feel unsupported, as if the rug has been pulled out from under me. I am the best designer on staff; in many ways, I am the only real designer in the department. Everyone else has the skill set of a production artist, technically proficient but not visually creative. None of the women are good enough at marketing to see that truth. The norm of American business culture is to pretend that everyone’s ability and contribution is equal to the success of the company. Until they fire you.

That scene feels like it is about my present employer. The next one is about my prior employer, although one character, an East Indian engineer, is from the present.

The next scene takes place at the old Shakopee office building that was across the street from a large oak forest, near Mystic Lake and the Mdewakanton reservation. (My grandmother was a member of the reservation. The forest is long gone.) Couples in the company who were suspected of having affairs would walk in the woods together at lunchtime. The company had many HR issues: blatant racism (especially against the local Dakota people) and sexism, plus overt conservative political and evangelical religious pressures. Being a privately held company, they got away with a lot.

In my dream, I am creating a simple clay sculpture of a small building, about six inches long by four inches wide and four inches tall. In the middle of my process, the Indian engineer checks the resiliency of the piece. He is able to pull the base layer of the foundation apart from the rest of the tiny red clay bricks. So I slaver the row of bricks with super glue to make the repair. Done. In spite of that success, I am very conscious of, and emotionally disturbed by, all of the unprofessional chaos in the office environment that surrounds me.

The final episode that I remember clearly (though there are others) is about a young woman I work with at my present job. I have dreamt of her, or at least her name, before. Tonya/Tanya. In my dream she is being horribly abused by Jane, the former VP of Marketing, even though everyone agrees that Tonya is highly talented and a very valuable member of the team. I feel terrible. The young woman is being stalked aggressively by the older, manic, cruel older woman.

Day notes:

I awake from this dream saddened by the content. I seldom have dreams with this obvious psychological structure any more. I do know what has been the prompt: I contacted a former coworker in Portland via LinkedIn. There had been a mass firing a month ago of people who were coming to work under the influence of crystal meth. My former coworker had worked in HR for many years and she refused to take the drug test that was now being required to keep one’s job because she felt there were racial implications (Hispanic temp workers who failed the drug test were fired, full-time white workers who failed the test had a second chance.) Therefore, she was fired. I shared some of my story of the sexual predator and because of her experience and her history in HR, she had an interesting take on what I have been going through. It is making me rethink everything. She told me to check state regulations and perhaps contact a few organizations. I know she is researching her own situation with the ACLU. Will she hire an attorney? That was the recommendation I got at the IASD conference.

There are three women involved in my sexual predator case: the VP of HR, the VP of Marketing and the predator’s boss.

The name Tanya is derived from Tatiana, an early Russian Christian martyr.

Today’s tarot card, the seven of wands, has this query on one website: “Are you about to become a whistleblower?”