Eyes Of A Blue Dog

I fell in love with Gabriel Garcia Marquez's writing in high school. I think the term "magic realism" fits it perfectly and is what made the text so appealing to me. Lately I like more colloquial language, but Garcia Marquez's is just within reach that I get don't bored, but far enough that I can't breeze through it without giving my brain a rest.

100 Years of Solitude took me a week, then I followed it up with Garcia Marquez's Collected Stories. If you never have, read both of these at the same time. It's excellent. Characters who are mentioned in passing in the novel have their own story in the collection, and vice versa. One character even stars in both..her life being introduced in the novel and finished in a story.

My favorite short story has always been "Eyes of a Blue Dog"...there was an image in my head immediately connected with that phrase, but it has since been replaced with any of George Rodrigue's paintings in his Blue Dog series. Anyway, the story is about a man and a woman who dream of each other; their interaction is intimate but unromantic, they remember knowing each other from past dreams and inform the reader that the man is "the only man who doesn't remember anything of what he's dreamed after he wakes up." Eyes of a blue dog is their secret message to one another, or rather from the woman to the man in the awoken world. She writes it anywhere she can in hopes that he will see it and remember.

I thought about this story in the shower an hour ago. Last night, a friend told me she was reading 100 Years of Solitude and I recommended the book of Collected Stories, same as I have now. But more importantly - to me anyway - this morning I woke up from a dream about a tall boy with dirty blond hair. In the dream I knew his face, his name, his mannerisms, his sense of humor..I knew our history as a couple - but of course these are all things you forget when your phone sings to you from your nightstand and you squint at the phone number on the display before silencing the ringtone. I laid in bed thinking about this stranger I knew so well a few moments ago and remembered that it wasn't my first dream about him. A week, maybe two, ago I dreamt about another brown-and-blond-haired boy - but that dream started when we first got together, before skipping to us being a couple. I wouldn't have connected the two at all except that 1. I have never dated or been seriously attracted to anyone but dark-haired boys, and 2. In both dreams he made a gesture to me: different gestures but similar and under the same context.

I believe in dreams, I believe in their interpretations by the dreamer, and this isn't the first time I've dreamt of a recurring subject. I'll have to think about this one, maybe visit the dream interpreters at Farmer's Market, and whisper eyes of a blue dog to a few blond(ish)-haired boys.

Middle School, Map-Jacket, Mode: Life

I can't shake the feeling today that I'm waiting for something. It's only been today so I think it's the start of waiting. Sure, there are actually things that I'm waiting for (calls from jobs I've applied to, meeting people now that I'm in a "new" place, for life to unfold), but sometimes I get the feeling that something is coming in my direction and I just have to wait. The first time I got this feeling was in middle school. I guess it was similar to today in some ways. I woke up at a friend's house one weekend morning after a sleepover and remembered dreaming about a boy in my grade. He wasn't anyone special, I just dreamt about him. Then I had the feeling I was waiting for something. I think the feeling had started a little before that morning, but I connect that morning with knowing I had that feeling. Today I woke up at a friend's house in Santa Cruz and remembered my dream about a boy who I was dating (in the dream), and since I've felt like I'm waiting. Of course, I didn't remember the middle-school incident when I started waiting so I don't think it was just the memory that triggered the sensation, but I'm comparing both incidents now. I can't remember if anything significant happened in middle school or if the waiting ended at any one time. We'll see when this new one ends.

Anyway, I was just in Santa Cruz and I can sufficiently describe the visit with the nouns 'warmth', and 'music' - there was a lot of each. I laid in blankets on the floor with my friends, I laid in the sun that was shining through the window while I read, I sat by a fire outside, I sat in front of the furnace at a friend's house while watching Totoro and drinking hot cocoa (that's two warmths in one). People played guitar and sang, people played music on their laptops, we listened to a fiddle-banjo-guitar combo at the aforementioned fire outside, we chose mix tapes to play in the car on the drive, and we danced to my friends' friends' band (The Best Friends--awesome band). Another trend: I saw way more maps than I have in a long time. Every house had a map on the wall, and there was one blow-up globe and one map-jacket. I think everyone there knows where they are and are very happy to be there.

So it was a very nice transition for me to get out of funk week (last week I did nothing, seriously) and into life mode (yes, I have a life mode). This week, I have a list of things I need to do, including finding work, time with friends, projects, exercise, exploring, and a birthday. I think it will help me wait, too. I love surprises, but I'm impatient.

P.S. I hate coming up with titles. That's a lie, sometimes I love it, but usually, no. Anyway the title of this is three things which I like sometimes but which reminds me of the book I just read: Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, by Haruki Murakami. Great author.