I read somewhere online that Covid is making us all have strange dreams because of the strange situation we find ourselves in.
I have seen a change in the types of dreams I have - quite predictably there were dreams where I could not ventilate the patient, or discovered that I had the virus. But there has also been a strong theme of food dreams. Maybe people (including me) are cooking and baking more, because it is something that we can control?
I had a dream where I was the celebrity chef on a TV show and I was demonstrating to everyone how to make a lasagna. Never mind in real life I have never made a lasagna, but in the dream I could do it perfectly. First I cooked down the onions slowly, added black beans (it was a vegetarian lasagna), tomatoes and red wine and put the lot to simmer. Then I made the white sauce which was a simple flour-butter roux followed by lots of stirring in milk. Then I layered the lot and baked it till the smell was amazing. When I woke up I knew exactly what I had to do that day - make a lasagna! Stirring the silky white sauce was as luxuriant as in the dream, it was the only therapy that I needed that day, and the bubbling of cheese in the oven...
I had another dream where I was making Cacio e pepe. A strange Italian theme, perhaps, because I don't usually make Italian food. In the dream, I tossed the perfectly cooked spaghetti (I think a reference to the Windup bird chronicle that I am reading) into the cheese, coating it with a little pasta water to thicken it to a lovely sauce. Every strand of spaghetti was coated with this glorious shiny cheesy peppery sauce. I woke up with my stomach grumbling and ran downstairs to make it for breakfast. Sadly in real life my cheese stuck together into a stubborn play-dough like clump at the bottom of the bowl. I put the lot on a pan to try and melt the cheese, but alas the clump just got stuck to the pan. In the end I ate a plain-ish bowl of spaghetti for breakfast!
-----
Onto more serious dreams now.
I had two dreams very close together featuring my friend S who I very rarely talk to. In the first dream, he called me to ask what was happening with his father since he could not get anyone to help him. His father is elderly and living in the middle of the Italian epicentre for Covid-19, so I suppose the anxiety that underlies this dream is quite real, though he never said anything of the sort to me in real life.
He said that he had called several hospitals and none would send an ambulance to fetch his father. I thought it was odd (even in the dream) that from a family of doctors he would be asking for my opinion, but I said it was OK for him to turn the video on. Once I could see his father, he looked grey, withered and unconscious. S shouted at his father to wake up, and there was no stirring. I looked very closely at his chest, but it did not seem to be moving. S said that his father had been talking about his mother calling him to heaven (but in real life both his parents are alive and well!) I had this surreal ice-in-veins feeling that he was already dead. I didn't know how to say this to him as he began to cry on the video link. At that moment, I realised how many of my friends I have never seen show any vulnerability, as if they were perfect humans with perfect lives and any small hiccup is just that, a small hiccup. Then I woke up.
A few nights later, I dreamt of being inside a beautiful garden. It was like something out of a TV show, separate areas showcasing gorgeous well manicured flowers with a neatly raked pebbly path leading between the areas. The path seemed to lead way off into the distance with many side branches. I think I was a bird, because I was floating above the garden and though I could see the crunchy stones, I could not feel them underfoot. Then I heard a sound and realised that someone else was in the garden. S was lost in one of these branches of the garden. I went over to him and realised that he was lost. Not just lost in the garden, but lost in life. Maybe it was because he had become an orphan in my previous dream?
He seemed oblivious to the surroundings. There was no sound in the garden at all except for the crunching of his shoes on the pebbly pathway. He moved closer to see some of the flowers up close, then moved onto the next one. He seemed to be moving at an imperceptible pace, and I started to feel extremely impatient.
Why is he stuck there like some useless fool? I felt angry at him for no apparent reason in the dream.
I willed for him to get out into the rest of the garden - there is so much to see! What other flowers are waiting for him? But he was not aware of my presence and I had no voice.
Then I saw that he was holding a small notebook, one of those that fit into the palm. He was writing something in it, and I got closer to see. I looked over his shoulder, so close to him but he still didn't know that I was there. His handwriting in the notebook is nothing like his real handwriting. In real life his writing is blunt, angulated and messy, like that of a mad science professor. In the dream it was gentle, rounded and loopy, much like a Victorian lady (maybe like Jane Austen's handwriting?)
I could see that he was writing a list of descriptors for the flowers. There were many words on the page, all of them adjectives. The three that I remembered just before I woke up were
Small
Yellow
Round
Then I left the garden and came back into the real world.
I have seen a change in the types of dreams I have - quite predictably there were dreams where I could not ventilate the patient, or discovered that I had the virus. But there has also been a strong theme of food dreams. Maybe people (including me) are cooking and baking more, because it is something that we can control?
I had a dream where I was the celebrity chef on a TV show and I was demonstrating to everyone how to make a lasagna. Never mind in real life I have never made a lasagna, but in the dream I could do it perfectly. First I cooked down the onions slowly, added black beans (it was a vegetarian lasagna), tomatoes and red wine and put the lot to simmer. Then I made the white sauce which was a simple flour-butter roux followed by lots of stirring in milk. Then I layered the lot and baked it till the smell was amazing. When I woke up I knew exactly what I had to do that day - make a lasagna! Stirring the silky white sauce was as luxuriant as in the dream, it was the only therapy that I needed that day, and the bubbling of cheese in the oven...
I had another dream where I was making Cacio e pepe. A strange Italian theme, perhaps, because I don't usually make Italian food. In the dream, I tossed the perfectly cooked spaghetti (I think a reference to the Windup bird chronicle that I am reading) into the cheese, coating it with a little pasta water to thicken it to a lovely sauce. Every strand of spaghetti was coated with this glorious shiny cheesy peppery sauce. I woke up with my stomach grumbling and ran downstairs to make it for breakfast. Sadly in real life my cheese stuck together into a stubborn play-dough like clump at the bottom of the bowl. I put the lot on a pan to try and melt the cheese, but alas the clump just got stuck to the pan. In the end I ate a plain-ish bowl of spaghetti for breakfast!
-----
Onto more serious dreams now.
I had two dreams very close together featuring my friend S who I very rarely talk to. In the first dream, he called me to ask what was happening with his father since he could not get anyone to help him. His father is elderly and living in the middle of the Italian epicentre for Covid-19, so I suppose the anxiety that underlies this dream is quite real, though he never said anything of the sort to me in real life.
He said that he had called several hospitals and none would send an ambulance to fetch his father. I thought it was odd (even in the dream) that from a family of doctors he would be asking for my opinion, but I said it was OK for him to turn the video on. Once I could see his father, he looked grey, withered and unconscious. S shouted at his father to wake up, and there was no stirring. I looked very closely at his chest, but it did not seem to be moving. S said that his father had been talking about his mother calling him to heaven (but in real life both his parents are alive and well!) I had this surreal ice-in-veins feeling that he was already dead. I didn't know how to say this to him as he began to cry on the video link. At that moment, I realised how many of my friends I have never seen show any vulnerability, as if they were perfect humans with perfect lives and any small hiccup is just that, a small hiccup. Then I woke up.
A few nights later, I dreamt of being inside a beautiful garden. It was like something out of a TV show, separate areas showcasing gorgeous well manicured flowers with a neatly raked pebbly path leading between the areas. The path seemed to lead way off into the distance with many side branches. I think I was a bird, because I was floating above the garden and though I could see the crunchy stones, I could not feel them underfoot. Then I heard a sound and realised that someone else was in the garden. S was lost in one of these branches of the garden. I went over to him and realised that he was lost. Not just lost in the garden, but lost in life. Maybe it was because he had become an orphan in my previous dream?
He seemed oblivious to the surroundings. There was no sound in the garden at all except for the crunching of his shoes on the pebbly pathway. He moved closer to see some of the flowers up close, then moved onto the next one. He seemed to be moving at an imperceptible pace, and I started to feel extremely impatient.
Why is he stuck there like some useless fool? I felt angry at him for no apparent reason in the dream.
I willed for him to get out into the rest of the garden - there is so much to see! What other flowers are waiting for him? But he was not aware of my presence and I had no voice.
Then I saw that he was holding a small notebook, one of those that fit into the palm. He was writing something in it, and I got closer to see. I looked over his shoulder, so close to him but he still didn't know that I was there. His handwriting in the notebook is nothing like his real handwriting. In real life his writing is blunt, angulated and messy, like that of a mad science professor. In the dream it was gentle, rounded and loopy, much like a Victorian lady (maybe like Jane Austen's handwriting?)
I could see that he was writing a list of descriptors for the flowers. There were many words on the page, all of them adjectives. The three that I remembered just before I woke up were
Small
Yellow
Round
Then I left the garden and came back into the real world.
Your stress is poignant. We know you are doing an incredibly vital job, and I think all your readers hope wish you an easier time if that's possible. I'm especially admiring of you as I have no job to do at all, and can't reasonably volunteer to do anything.
ReplyDeletebe well... mae at maefood.blogspot.com