20th December, 2011.
Tuesday

For the few hours before bed I was preparing a unit for next year on Gothicism. Consequently, I was reading essays on Brahm Stoker’s Dracula. These included Feminist, Marxist, Homosexual and Post Structualist readings. It’s not at all surprising then that vampires featured heavily in my dreams.

Vampire
I don’t remember the beginning of this dream.
I’m on the floor of a small room and there’s a dark haired female vampire about my age (a shadow self, perhaps) whom I can see in the adjoining room. I know I’ve already been bitten and I’m dreading further bites. She approaches the door and I see there are a couple of young women out there with her so I suggest she bite them – they’re younger. Then I feel that was selfish and cruel. In any case, she has her own ideas and approaches and bites me on the back of my neck.
I try to shorten her drinking by pretending to swoon and she leaves me alone temporarily. Then she sees me again through the door and clearly realizes she could have taken more blood/life force, so she returns for more. While she feeds I begin to recall some of the reading I did before bed that suggested that the vampire in Stoker’s novel represents male dominance through the penetrative act, even when the vampire is a (transgressive)female, and that the blood drinking represents sex - only people couldn’t write about such things in a sexually repressive society. This memory triggers mild sexual excitement while the vampire feeds and when I mention it to her she promises some satisfaction of that impulse later. I vaguely wonder what that might entail.

Now I’m alone and Beth crawls to the doorway. She knows what has happened to me and states sympathetically, “Female monsters are far worse than males.”

Note: Beth’s statement is interesting. As a former male, I guess she’d be in a reasonable position to compare male and female monsters. She recently spent many weeks in hospital with a serious infection that could have taken her life and could be classified as a “female monster.” This renewed our contact, though I didn’t know about it until towards the end of her hospital stay. That renewal quickly turned sour for various reasons and I simply ceased contact with a person I believed was beginning to behave monstrously. No doubt, she felt the same about me.

I wake up and can hear a “radio”. This time the astral noise is so consistent, distinct and long-lasting that I think the clock radio must have been accidentally reset and I lift my head from the pillow. I hear it for some time before it fades away and then I’m mildly annoyed because I could have possibly used the state to project.

Another vampire dream follows. I can’t recall details. It’s possibly set in a doctor’s office.

Toddler

I’ve been caring for a toddler for some years but now it’s the end of that period. I explain it to the little blond boy but I’m not sure he understands. I load him into a stroller, planning to take him for a walk. There are other things I’m taking too, the accouterments that accompany babyhood. The family’s pet dog, a boxer, might also accompany us.

I stroll down the street and encounter a group of youth. I’m not sure of them but a young dark-haired male puts out his hand to give the baby a high five.

Now G and I are loading baby into the car. I’ve placed him in his safety capsule and G is behind the car carrying the boxer, its legs folded like a deer. He’s going to put it in the boot but I suggest he not do that, so he places it in a plastic laundry basket inside the car.

Note: I wonder if this dream in some way references my oldest son leaving home for uni next year. Some of the references, such as a dog and the basket, come from the previous day spent with my younger son. While we walked the dog we briefly discussed me minding their children and even their dog, once I am retired. We also shopped and among the items I bought was a new laundry basket.