Take Me Out To The Black...

I just -- JUST -- woke up from a dream that I was both IN and WATCHING a sequel to SERENITY.

I'm not up to writing just yet -- this is in real life -- and I'm basically killing time until Gnomey wakes up, so I lay down for a nap.

I fell asleep really considering why I do what I do, or why I WANT to do what I want to be doing (making movies and writing stories for a living) because I haven't really had a good think about that in a while. (I spend so much of time time just trying to do it I often don't really stop to ask myself why I try so hard when I never seem to get more than a single baby-step closer to my goals.) I'm articulating, to myself, in my head, the reasons as I drift off.

(If you're curious, I still like my reasons and motives for trying to break into writing professionally, and so will continue writing and trying to "make it".)

The next thing I'm aware of is both watching a sequel to SERENITY and also playing Jane. Stuff is happening -- terribly exciting stuff, both spectacle and SFX as well as exciting and fulfilling character stuff (none of which can I remember the details about, except a HUGE explosion that tosses everyone all over everywhere (without hurting us) somewhere in the Opening of the flick) -- and I'm just really having a great time.

Then I wake up for half a minute, check the time -- still hours before Gnomey is likely to be online -- and fall back into this great dream.

In the second part of it, though, I AM A CHARACTER in this Firefly movie, and I have this great, emotional sort of scene with Mal. I remember telling him about how his reaction to this thing that happened earlier scared me (though my character is very Jane-like still, and outsiders don't ever seem to know when I'm frightened because I keep plugging away, doing whatever needs to be done) and Mal (not really Nathan Fillion in this secotion of the dream because we're all sort of living this movie, even though the fact seems to be that it IS still a movie, somehow) expresses surprise at my revelation, and then we're attacked by someone big.

We're all in this motel room and our ship is outside, so Mal and the others run to the ship. Now, for whatever reason, I've been living in this motel room with Brian and my mom up until now, so I have some stuff to pack. Brian and Mom have moved, but I haven't left this motel room for years, and even thought I've packed all my clothes except my boots into this suitcase, as I grab my last few items (which is important to the action of the movie, to get the dramatic timing right, I somehow know) I suddenly realize I have all these things that I need to take with me. One suitcase becomes a suitcase and a few crates and some electronics and extension cords and surge protectors and even some sentimental momentos that I know I'll have to leave behind.

To make matters worse, I realize that, for some reason I can't figure out, when I changed clothes earlier I slipped into my jeans, rather than one of the pairs of cargo shorts I now wear faithfully. In real life I ware cargo shorts because I carry a lot of crap around with me everywhere, and pants with 6 or more pockets allow for more efficient organization of my crap and ease of carriage. The looseness also allows for ease of motion. And now I'm in an action situation, and I actually NEED all the extra crap and ease of motion.

But Mal is outside yelling for me to fun for it, and I still have to put my boots on.

And with all the explosions and confusion outside, I can't get a good enough look around the room to find my suitcase, much less figure out what I need to take and what I should just leave behind, and how I'm going to carry it all, and should I just lug my boots with me until I'm safely on the ship and the ship is lifting off?

Then I hear Mal yell "Run for it!" one more time and this time I sense that whatever time I had to organize my stuff is now past, and I now have to run for the ship, or risk Mal or someone running back to the motel room to rescue me (which would be well embarrassing since I'm not in trouble or anything, I just can't organize my crap, and my confusion is putting myself, the crew and the ship more and more at risk with every passing second)! So I'll carry the boots and the suitcase -- once I figure out where IT is now -- and I'll change into a pair of cargo pants when I'm safely on the ship...

And I wake myself up.

I'm not completely awake, mind you, I'm just out of that world and back in my bedroom. But the moment I realize this I decide that I don't HAVE TO make decisions under pressure in the Firefly 'verse. It's just a dream.

So I pad into here and decide to jot this all down in a blog entry.

It's interesting, because last night at work (before everyone went home and left me alone with the station) I passed out in my chair for a few minutes and had another dream in which I was both watching and participating in a movie.

In last night's dream, I lived out a half-hour section of the movie, and I noticed how something important happened every 15 minutes, and that the scenes leading up to it were sort of "partial scenes" where a lot of story takes place off-screen. But then when that Minute-15 Scene happens, everything takes place ON SCREEN and plays out in minute detail. And somehow that's how the audience knows that something important is happening, even if they're not clear how or why it's important.

I'm a freak, right?

Anyway...

You think this is what people mean when they say they "eat, sleep, breath" what they do? If I'm not writing or thinking about the story, I'm pondering why I write, then falling asleep and dreaming in movies.

I think it's the deadline, and watching my first word count marker rapidly approaching.

Sea turtles.

That's what it is, mate.

It's sea turtles.

:D