Olympic Dreams

I know you don’t want to hear about it, but last night I had a dream in which we were cleaning out our tiny tenement house in some crime-infested section of a big city.

Nobody wants to hear about anybody else’s dream. It’s always, “so then we were in this tenement house but it turned into a carnival and some guy – it might have been Moses or maybe Jethro Tull – anyway – he had this cow, which was really a blueberry muffin …” and so on. But I have a point, so bear with me.

The house in my dream was “secured” by doors with giant dead bolts, but the doors themselves were ¼ inch thick, rotting wood that would not stop a determined fly from breaking through, let alone the neighborhood thugs.Why the criminals wanted to break in I don’t know, because the house was filled with only piles and piles and piles of old clothes we were cleaning out of the closets and drawers. They were possibly all the clothes that were missing in all my other lifelong dreams about showing up late for important tests and interviews.

Over the past two weeks we have heard all about Olympic athletes “dreaming of this day” and “pursuing lifelong dreams”, yadda, yadda, yadda. No one has dreams like that. The only pursuit in dreams is that guy (who might be Moses – or maybe Jethro Tull) pursuing you with the intent to do something horrible involving a cow muffin. The only worldwide exposure you dream about is standing naked on the ice – late for your event but with the entire media still there. Only Johnny Weir enjoys this dream.

I’m not saying that no one ever actually dreams at night about Olympic victory but that, when they do, it would have a bizarre twist to it. Liner visualization of winning an event occurs when we imagine or fantasize or maybe daydream about achieving it. And I’m not saying that all night dreams are bad dreams. I have had a good dream about being on the Olympic medal platform. Naked. With Lindsey Vonn. The media is not there. And I know you don’t want to hear about it.