When the subconscious is simple

The Dream -- Pablo Picasso, 1932

This probably won't make much of a blog post, but I feel compelled to tell you about a dream I had last night. Those of you who believe dreams to be incredibly boring need not read any further than this, although I might include a poem at the end (hint: Billy Collins).  Also, if you're not a blogger or blog-reading addict, the dream entails a famous one. For the rest of you, settle in. I'll give you a moment.












So, last night I dreamed -- or is it dreamt? -- that I lived next door to Stephanie Nielson of Nie Nie fame. She's that beautiful woman and mother, burned in a terrible airplane crash years ago whose blog caught my attention along with the rest of the planet. She's what's called a Mormon Mom blogger, and while I have absolutely nothing in common with her (other than, perhaps, an unsurpassing love for my children), I have a nearly insatiable curiosity about her seeming ability to live a perfect life despite incredible physical hardship. She's basically a sainted Martha Stewart on steroids given to her by Jesus Christ or Joseph Smith Himself.

Anywho. Back to the dream.

I lived next door to the Neilson's and learned this when I paid a visit to their house to borrow something. I wandered right into the house, not knowing its occupants despite a party going on, and I caught sight of one of Nie Nie's daughters standing in a doorway. She was the one with the brown hair who looks exactly like her mother before her mother was disfigured in the plane crash (although the mother is still spectacularly beautiful in an ineffable way that comes out of her eyes). OK, I admit it. I know the girl's name because I've read about their family religiously for the last five or more years. It's Claire. The next thing I knew, I was running out of the house like some kind of Mrs. Cravits, eager to tell my friends that Nie Nie had moved into the neighborhood. I don't remember if I was successful in getting whatever it was that I had gone into the house to borrow, but on my way out, I had to make my way past a gigantic boat, the NieNie boat, that was as high as a skyscraper, parked in the front yard at the edge of a clump of sky-high bamboo. Now that I think about it, it might have been an ark, and it was difficult to run by, but I did and kept running.

That was it. That was my dream. When I woke up and recalled it, I felt embarrassed. Why the hell am I dreaming about these people? Is my subconscious a shallow creek when I thought it to be a deep and dark reservoir? Have Nie's recent postings of her childrens' ardent Mormon faith embedded themselves, like tentacles, in my agnostic brain? What would Jung say? What say you, dear Reader?

Here's a poem:

The First Dream

The Wind is ghosting around the house tonight
and as I lean against the door of sleep
I begin to think about the first person to dream,
how quiet he must have seemed the next morning

as the others stood around the fire
draped in the skins of animals
talking to each other only in vowels,
for this was long before the invention of consonants.

He might have gone off by himself to sit
on a rock and look into the mist of a lake
as he tried to tell himself what had happened,
how he had gone somewhere without going,

how he had put his arms around the neck
of a beast that the others could touch
only after they had killed it with stones,
how he felt its breath on his bare neck.

Then again, the first dream could have come
to a woman, though she would behave,
I suppose, much the same way,
moving off by herself to be alone near water,

except that the curve of her young shoulders
and the tilt of her downcast head
would make her appear to be terribly alone,
and if you were there to notice this,

you might have gone down as the first person
to ever fall in love with the sadness of another. 

Billy Collins

Me and Nie and a Correction

****I made a few mistakes in this post, namely describing the attack on the Muslim woman as being from her husband when actually the attack came from a man whom she had rejected when he proposed to marry her. I also called her an Arab when she is Persian -- I wasn't aware of the difference (my own grandfather was a Christian Syrian). Here's the definition of both: The Arabs, though themselves not homogenous, are a Semitic people, whereas the Persians are Indo-Iranian, their language belonging to the Indo-European language family. In short, they are historically, culturally, linguistically and ethnically separate populations who happen to share a home in the Middle East. (from Wiki answers). Thank you, Chris, for straightening me out!
Despite my inaccuracies, my opinion remains the same.

I've followed the story of Stephanie Nielson, the Mormon blogger horribly burned and disfigured in a plane crash several years ago. I've marveled with the rest of the blogging planet at her resilience, beauty and grace and admired her devotion to her family and husband. While her writing isn't particularly inspiring, the photos she posts of her beautiful children and the home she's created are fascinating in their seeming perfection, and above all her strength in recovery and honesty about its difficulty are at the very least, moving, and awe-inspiring otherwise. I think pretty harshly about the Mormon religion and its constructs, but I admire Stephanie's faith in something larger than herself and can only wonder, from a distance, on how she does it. 


When I opened up her blog, though, last night and saw the photo of her in the arms of Glen Beck, I practically fell out of my chair. I'll be blunt: I find Glen Beck to be a repulsive sycophant who has done as much as anyone to promote the image of our country as a bunch of ignorant charlatans. I watched the video that Stephanie posted and not only fell out of my chair but lay there on the floor, beating my head against it. Basically, Beck tells Stephanie's story -- and it's a moving one if you don't know it already -- and brings attention to a recent 20/20 episode that featured Stephanie and her family. He underlines Stephanie's Christian faith in God. He highlights a segment of an interview with Stephanie where she tearfully explains how difficult it is for her to be mocked or stared at in public by children and adults but how she forgives those people. This is all good -- I know that I learn from the strength of others, and I struggle myself with my feelings toward those who stare out and speak rudely of Sophie when we are in public. I am often humbled by Stephanie's grace in the face of far bigger problems.

But then Beck does his thing. He tells the story of a PERSIAN woman who has also been horribly disfigured and blinded as the result of acid burns inflicted on her by her husband. In the country where this has happened, the perpetrator is to be punished in the same manner as his crime, and guess what? Beck condemns the horribly disfigured woman as a vengeful, evil person because she wants her husband burned in the same way as she has been. Well, he doesn't actually condemn her as much as he condescendingly shakes his head and contorts his face, suggesting these Muslims are crazy, evil people now, aren't they? I looked closely for his tell-tale tears, but I didn't see any. To tell you the truth, it was the longest I'd ever listened to the guy. Now, if you've been reading my blog for any amount of time or know me, you know that I'm NOT an eye for an eye kind of person. Although my mouth is as big as the Grand Canyon, I generally tilt toward pacifism, and I certainly don't support the barbaric practices of backward countries. So I'm not going to defend this poor woman's motivations. But Stephanie Nielsen and this Muslim woman have only the terrible scars in common and literally nothing else. I believe that Beck has used Stephanie to help his flagging popularity and he's done so with customary repulsive tactics.

Why am I writing all of this? Partly because it incenses me and partly because I find it fascinating. I think it's gloriously human to be drawn to and strengthened by stories of people overcoming great obstacles and even tragedy, but I think it's uniquely American to turn these stories into fodder for the commercial machine. It makes me sick that Glen Beck has done so.