I suppose I needed a reminder of the reasons why I take not one but two different medications for my sleep hygiene. After work on Thursday, Hiro and I drove to our local Japanese supermarket, Uwajimaya, to shop for dinner and a few supplies. (My favorite mayonnaise, Kewpie, was on sale.)
Hiro noticed a new beer in the refrigerated case, one from Niigata Prefecture and made with some rice among the barley and hops, 越後麦酒 (Echigo—the old name for Niigata—mugishu—the old word for beer). We tried it that night; it’s a very pale pilsner, but, to my palate, it was too watery.
In the past, I’d noticed that combining alcohol with my medications (trazodone and clonidine) made for unpleasant sleeping, so I forewent both sets of pills and slept raw.
Zero out of five stars. Do not recommend.
I was restless all night, tossing and turning, and woke on Friday with both a headache and a mean case of the grumps.
Friday night, I restored the trazodone dose—I save the clonidine for particularly stressful days; it has annoying side effects for me, dry mouth and constipation.
Yesterday, I woke well enough, I suppose, but with another headache that, oddly, got worse after taking a painkiller. I ran an errand to British Columbia and back the same day, and predicted (accurately) that, with the trazodone boost, I would sleep well.
Right before waking, I found myself in a dream. I’m not very good at analyzing them—I always wonder which aspects of my personality are assigned, as avatars, to people I know—but here’s what I picked up on.
In my dream, I was in Japan, one of my happy places.
Much of the early parts of the dream occurred in a train station. Such locales often serve as anxiety identifiers in my dreams; the classic running late scenarios. As labyrinthine as the dream station was, however, there was no sense of anxiety. Hiro, with his poor sense of direction, might hate navigating them, but I pride myself on my mastery of even the most complicated stations, like Shinjuku and Tōkyō and Ueno. Instead of anxiety, I felt at home and ready to explore.
I also understand the symbolism of train stations. Things are changing, and I’m moving in new directions, to new places, despite the horrors of our present.
Adjacent to the station was the (relocated, enlarged, and revamped) high school where I taught for my first three years in Japan. The reality version of my experience there was riddled with both highs and lows, but this dream version excited me. The student body was mature and curious, ready to talk with me in multiple languages. (If my friend Bill is reading this, there was a Ja! Der Geist spricht! moment, too.) I noticed my Three Graces, the three English teachers at my high school, with whom I became friends. Although they looked older in the dream, I recognized and greeted Mssrs. Fukumoto (who always had a dad joke at the ready), Tsunoda (who shared my love of music and who, after an introduction to a friend that built and repaired harpsichords, and needed an article on such translated into English, birthed my translation career), and Hamatsu (who was as big a tech head as Hiro is, and who let me tag along to Akihabara on many a Sunday in 1989, back when Akihabara was much more about tiny vendors selling electronic equipment than about maid cafés and Kart racing), happy to see them despite the reality in which all three have already gone on to their glory. There, too, was my (gratefully still very much alive) friend, Ann Marie, a woman I’ve known for more than forty years. When I asked her why she was in Japan, her answer—to explore celibacy—was more a reminder of the lasting psychic impact of Melissa Febos’s latest memoir, The Dry Season (which I recently reviewed) than on Ann Marie.
This aspect of the dream, schools and old friends, can likely be interpreted in several ways. I choose, however, to draw my conclusions: a school indicates my love of learning and my love of sharing knowledge, and the dream reminds me to keep doing both of those things. At the same time, the dream calls on me to honor the many, many people my mind and heart carry with me.
Hungry for more? I have some other updates to share.
The reviews editor at Hippocampus Magazine, for whom I review memoirs, recently shared the magazine’s updated style guide for reviews. At the end of that document was a list of three existing reviews that the reviews team should consider as exemplars of the art. First on that list was my June review.
I am also very proud to share that the Pacific Northwest Writer’s Association has chosen an opening excerpt from the manuscript of my memoir, Crying in a Foreign Language, to be one of only five finalists for their annual Unpublished Book Award in the memoir category. The winners will be announced at the awards dinner in September, and writers named first, second, and third in each category will be offered time after the dinner to speak with agents and editors. So yes, I will be there!
Lastly, and with apologies for Hiro’s distracted videography, I offer this video of an a cappella performance I performed in for the wedding of two friends. I haven’t sung professionally for decades, but I still got it!
Virtuosos! Lovely
Brian - I LOVE the photo of the doorway in Japan is always with me. A portal for the rest of us.