Covid Dreams

 It took a while, but the last year I started to have dreams with Covid themes. Not wearing masks, forgetting to wear a mask, etc.

Last night, I had  a dream involving someone very close to me who decided, for some unknown reason, to cut me off from their life. This hurt. Still hurts. It's baffling, confusing, hurtful. It also has ignited a huge flame of "fuck you what the fuck are you doing to us?" reaction.

Last night, I dreamt this person agreed to my invitation to come down to her state and be with her. The dream begins:

I'm in the back seat of a car with "Martina." We're in the middle of the back seat, with her husband, then Marinta, then me, then her son. Her daughter is no where to be seen. I don't know who is driving the car.

I am so happy!!!!! So happy! So happy that after more than a year, Martina has finally decided to bring me back into her life. So we're sitting in the back seat, and I hug her and kiss her. and all the past year is a non-issue. We will move on. So happy!

Then, very casually, "Martina" says to me "Oh, I have Covid." 

I say, "What? What do you mean, 'I have Covid?!"

Martina tells me that sure, she has Covid, but so what?

I am shocked, hurt and angered. I ask her how could she agree to meet with me knowing she will expose me to Covid?! She tells me I'm just being silly and paranoid and to get over it.

In the car, I open an envelope from my doctor. The forms say I did have Covid, a long time ago. But am free now.

Meanwhile, I am still very upset -- and hurt-- that this person so very close to me would be so cavilerabout Covid.

This dream is about how Covid seeps into our subconscious and our dreaming states, despite our intentions to not let the negative take over our lives.

On a very personal note, the person in my dream is someone very close to me -- a family member -- and I think that politics have merged into the twisted, gas lighting, mind fucking realm of Covid. This person, who I love and have protected and stood up for since her birth, has allowed politics (I think, for she won't say) take over love.

So, a reminder. Love. Patience. Compassion Non-judgement. Hard to do!!! I KNOW! But ...  when it comes to family, it seems to be that any system, be it political or religious, that demands your allegiance over you own family and friends, be on the side of family and friends. 

 

 

Finds in the Old Files

 Going through old files (see post below) and found these odd little gems:

Couldn't find anything on-line about this one. 

Old 'Mad Libs'

back of postcard from the Unarious Academy of Science; Ruth E. Norman (Uriel) Cosmic Visionary and Cofounder of Unarius

Skylaire Alfvegren: A Bittersweet Find

 Going through old files and notebooks today and I found this sweet letter from Skylaire Alfvegren, who very suddenly passed not long ago. Still cannot believe she is gone.

I am very sad that we never met in person. We talked on the phone, emailed -- even got together with a friend of hers who moved up here awhile back -- but never met Skylaire in person. She was an inspiration to me and I will always be in gratitude for her friendship.

Art and the X-Files

 I've been bingeing on X-Files lately. A feast! I've also been going through many of my art books, seeking inspiration. And found, to my surprise, The Art of the X-Files. Great find but have no memory of how I came to own this book. I don't remember, nor does my husband. Nothing mysterious here; no doubt, during my days as a folklore UFO nerd at the U of O, I purchased the book. Maybe it was a gift. Either way, nice discovery!

Covid Nightmares

Computer manipulated oil pastel on gray paper: Covid Nightmares

 It's taken me a good long year or more to really feel the depression and anxiety surrounding Covid. 

Two years ago in March, a few days before my birthday, I came home from the elementary school where I worked as an Instructional Assistant in the Title 1 program. And I never came back. Covid had just hit, and schools were shutting down, moving on to distance learning, etc. I had planned to retire that year and had just started that process. I was to finish out my contract until June, so, I did on line teaching until then. Also, we cancelled our annual It's Regan's Birthday Bash on the Oregon Coast in Yachats. Every year, forever, we went to the coastal town of Yachats to celebrate my birthday. Not that year. 

It was crazy, frustrating, and very strange. Laptops loaned to me from the district didn't work, learning the brand new systems was definitely a challenge, taking on line courses to justify my salary were boring and hard, and, seemed pointless since I was retiring. But I got through it.  (The challenges for certified teachers and the little kids were much harder.)

I don't mind wearing masks, I was vaccinated and got my booster. I wash my hands, take zinc and other supplements. The first year was okay. The second year, a bit harder. I miss visiting with friends. 

And lately, I realize it's really hit hard. I still mind the whole mask thing, but the paranoia has seeped into my subconscious. I don't feel comfortable meeting friends in public places. When I do, it's that little window in between Covid variants. One week it's safe, the next, not. Numbers of patients with Covid who are hospitalized go up, and, deaths. Medical staff shortages. Confusing data from the CDC and other organizations. Everywhere it seems a lot of people -- far too many! -- are behaving as if Covid is over, or, not so bad. Crowds at football games without masks, sitting right next to each other.

Also, as strange as it is to acknowledge, our ages no doubt have something to do with my anxieties. I'm in my late sixties, my husband in his seventies. We have all kinds of health issues (strokes, heart attacks, chronic asthma, and more...

So, hating the fact we're leery and a bit paranoid, we are, nonetheless. . . leery and paranoid.

Meanwhile, I feel guilty for not socializing, while others do without a care. I can't help but feel despair and anger at people's stupidity. And I am angry and also despair at the systems in charge, because they know what needs to be done, and it isn't getting done. It never will get done. That's what systems do. They gaslight us. They intentionally do the most blatant topsy turvy acts of absurdity.  

Covid Nightmare: "Bleh", oil pastel on gray paper, Regan Lee 2022

And now Covid has infected my dreams. I have dreams I walk into a store without a mask, and I'm horrified that I forgot. Or that others are not wearing masks, and we get into a fight. The past week, I've had two dreams where I had a bad case of Covid. I woke up very scared.

I tried to interpret the feeling those dreams gave me in this piece. But it was "blah." I manipulated the oil pastel on the computer, and was surprised at how this image gives a pretty good idea of what I'm feeling. 

Covid Nightmares. Indeed. The only thing I can say is that we need to be patient with each other and take care of ourselves. Such a simple thought, but hard to do. Especially now.

The Naked Eye, and Through the Lens Part One

 We see things we can't explain with the naked eye. And then we might take a photo, or look through binoculars, and the object appears very differently. 

I described one sighting in the post below. (Part Two.) Another sighting, also in Eugene, Oregon, happened about five years ago. It was New Year's Eve, and I was standing on my front porch at night, watching for fireworks, etc. Suddenly a weird light appeared from the east, traveling north west. It was a large shape and light (white) but through the binoculars it was something else entirely. It changed shape -- not seen with the naked eye but with the binocs ---  and then "zoomed" downwards and turning gray, then, blinked out. Just, gone.

Drone? Fancy firework? (I really don't think so.) Oh who knows. Strange nonetheless.

The Naked Eye, and Through the Lens Part Two

 At least twice, I have seen objects that appear one way with the naked eye, and quite another way through binoculars. 

One event that I remember, and I've posted about on-line years ago: 

I'm at my cousin-in-laws home. We're watching a slide show of a friends vacation. The cousins lived in the South Hills of Eugene, the house full of large picture windows. Great view. There we are, downstairs, and I'm looking at the little windows, just knowing that I will see a UFO that night. I just knew it. 

Sure enough, I see a white light, orb shaped, come bouncing along towards us. I don't say anything. Wife to cousin-in-law finally says (I remember wondering when she would say something, for I was watching her watching it) "Are. you seeing this?" [paraphrase.] 

We all look, and and watch, This round white bouncing light orb thing was certainly odd. No sound could be heard. And it didn't seem to behave anything like a plane, or helicopter. It was weird enough that we all ran upstairs. 

Upstairs. Huge picture windows in the hills over looking the small city of Eugene, Oregon. We watch the light, still coming our way. Someone gets binoculars. We go out on the small catwalk like balcony to get a better look. The person with the vacation slides; he's upset. He's actually pissed. Angry. He says he doesn't want to look at it, and walks away. One could say he was merely offended that we ignored his vacation slides in order to chase this light, but I got the feeling -- as did others that night --that he was truly upset by the light. I seem to remember him saying something like "I don't need to know what that is."

Looking at the white orb like object with the binoculars, the object appeared to be very different. Suddenly it was a rapidly changing thing. It changed shapes, from square to orb to triangle to rectangle. And, it changed color. With the naked eye, it was white. But through the binoculars, the colors changed with the shapes; red, blue, green, yellow/golden, turquoise.

We continued to watch this as it moved towards us, then behind some trees, and then, gone.

I'm not saying it was the Space Brothers. It could have been a drone. This was back in the early 1990s. Not long after I saw my Orange Orb and, during the few years following, all kinds of weird events took place.

Dreaming of the "Heart Card"

 As I wrote in the post below, (Mermaids in the Astral) you'd think I had indulged in a healthy amount of magic mushrooms last night. I don't know what my subconscious was doing, but clearly, it was having a good time.

So, aside from the dream where I was a mermaid with a lovely shimmering golden tail, I also dreamt about the tarot:

I am doing a reading for my niece, using my newest deck, the Dark Forest Tarot, which is another version of the Waite Rider Coleman tarot.  I tell my niece I like this deck a lot but it's a little darker than I expected. What attracted me to the deck was the sepia, toned down "darkness" but when I received the deck (complete with box and red velvet bag, groovy!) it was a bit darker than I expected. Still, I really like the deck.

I use the layout, or most of what I remember of the layout, of Dr. Art Rosengarten's Tarot of the Future: Raising Spiritual Consciousness."  What I remember is that the first card represents what the client thinks is going on,  what it feels like. The second card tells us what is really going on, on a deeper level. I don't remember the third card, so I create my own interpretation. The third card tells us what path to take to remain in a positive light.

 

The important thing about the third card is that the reader needs to place the "Heart Card" first, and then the tarot card partially touching the Heart Card.

All this takes place in a hut like room, where I live. It's painted turquoise. It's on the side of a rural type road. People come inside all day for readings. One day I find, as I'm shuffeling the cards, yellow cards mixed in with the deck. The are oriented horizontally, the long way, which is odd. They are a bright yellow, not pretty. And strange sigil like markings on the cards. No words, title, numbers or symbols. A few of the cards had a faint impression of a Major Arcana card, but you had to look closely to see it.  

I don't like these cards. They're ugly, and there's an uncomfortable feeling about the cards orientation. I have no idea how these cards got here, but I have a strong sense of a presence -- for lack of a better way to describe, angelic -- has something to do with this. And yet, it's not a malevolent vibe or anything negative. Just something odd and uncomfortable. 

Mermaids in the Astral

 You'd think I had taken 'shrooms last night, the journey my dreaming mind took.

I dreamt I was a mermaid, but also human. No one knows, except my husband (who is a dream figure, no one I know.) In order to keep my human appearance and my two legs to walk around on, I have to spend time in the secret pool that is in down several levels in our house. I access the pool by climbing up into a white cupboard (the entire room is white) and then down stairs to the pool. It is quiet and cool, the walls painted a soft green. No one knows about his place. It is completely hidden from the others in the house.

I swim, using my mermaid tail of course. When I leave the pool and come back into the house, I am on two legs again. My mermaid tale is a lovely shade of metallic golden yellow. I have a lucid moment, where I wonder to myself why my mermaid tale is gold/yellow, instead of green or blue.

My mermaid tattoo. 

Is the Owl a Mushroom?

 

Retirement, Work Dreams, Drums, and the Children

 I retired from working in the education field for twenty -two months, after working in education for over thirty five years. And since then, I've had dreams of working in education several times a week. The dreams don't stop.

They have changed, however.

I started off dreaming that I was at work, and ... well, as usual. Then, the dreams shifted. I would show up at work, but wasn't aware of my schedule. Then, I'd show up, but told I had to continue working until they figured things out. After that, I dreamt I was told by HR that I "owed" them time. I had to work for another three months or so until I paid off my debt. Sort of like a student loan deal.

Then, arrived at work doing my own thing, and no one seemed to know why I was there or what I was to be doing, including me. Then I 'd start questioning my involvement; do I get paid? I love what I do but if I don't get paid, and don't have a schedule of expectations ...

And sometimes my professors -- and here it gets to be really important, according to my non-objective interpretation -- from the Folkore program at the U of O would show up. I am all mixed up; do I teach 3rd grade, or go into the Folkore side of things?

Last night I had a dream where I arrive at the elementary school, okay, fine. Nice to be with the kids. But before I could get there, I hear drums. A drum circle! So wonderful. A great big huge drum circle! I want to join but, while I do have a drum (in Waking Life, I do, a dumbek) I don't know much about how to play. I really don't know anything about rhythm, beat, bass, etc. Just that I want to DRUM!

So I walk away from the school, and go off in search of the drum.

Clearly, these dreams are telling me that I can still, somehow, in some way, work with kids, but in a new way. A new path. I just have to figure it out. Create a bridge between my own creative self with the children. Because I miss the children.

I really miss the children!

But not the bullshit bureaucracy, crazy parents, and politics.

Oil Pastel: Orange Orb

 Orange Orb at Lorane Highway, oil pastel, metallic pastels on 90 lb. black paper 9" x 12" 2021

I've done a lot of orange orb drawings and paintings through the years, and some I liked, some I didn't. But this one I am very happy with. 

A Little X-Files Musing

Binging on all the X-Files episodes, from beginning to end. Of course I had already seen them all, at least once, if not a few times. But this time around, I realized that, among other factors , X-Files was a great love story between Mulder and Scully. Adult, mature, romantic and sexy all at once. Over time. Deep friendship within the love. So excellent. Still in my top five best ever paranormal TV shows.

I also was reminded that the episodes with Robert Patrick, who "replaced" David Duchovny as Fox Mulder, was excellent in his own right. Patrick's presence didn't do any harm and The X-Files was just as excellent. Of course, I do hold a special affection for Mulder and Scully.

My Top Paranormal Themed TV Shows:

The Outer Limits (original)

The Twilight Zone (original)

The X-Files

Millenium

Legion

Resident Alien

Fringe

And I know there are more but my post. Christmas head space can't get there right now.

A Very Strange OOBE

 

I had a highly unusual . . . OBE? Something, last night. I have never experienced anything like this before.

The experience had elements of familiar experiences: out of body, feeling "pulled" by something, or someone. Not being able to awaken my spouse. The awareness of an entity, or some kind of presence, an energy that was intelligent. The 'Old Hag" feeling, that sleep paralysis sensation.

But all those things, while present, don't come close to describing how incredibly and weirdly different last night's experience was. 

For one thing, I am not convinced I was dreaming. Not at all. Okay, I wasn't.

I find myself sitting upright in bed. Aware of a presence. I am all black; I've left my body and am next to myself. I can see myself. I am being pulled on my arms by ... a something. Or a someone. Or... some sort of intelligent thing. Creature? Being? Humanoid? Whatever it was, it wasn't human.

I try to get my husband to wake up. He wakes up easily. Not last night. I couldn't wake him up for anything. 

I don't like being pulled out of my body. And why am I all black, just my body shape? And if most all of me is "gone" (sitting beside myself, like I'm in a waiting room) why are they still pulling at me?

I finally get very pissed off. I tell them to knock it off. I'm scared, a bit. This thing that is happening is not pleasant, not good. It seems to stop, and I am still all black but back in my body, ready to leave it. I feel that buzzing feeling and hear the sounds that comes with OBE's.  I am both excited that I am leaving my body (my OBE's have become infrequent in my old age) but also nervous and wondering what now? But nothing happens. The presence leaves.

Again, this is so damn hard to explain. This whole episode was so intensely different than anything I have been through.

I'm a strong and vivid dreamer, always have been. I have had dozens of out of body experiences, all kinds of dreams on all kinds of levels, the sleep paralysis/Old Hag experience, etc. But this, this. Was just so out of anything I've experienced. This was a one of kind, highly strange, uncomfortable experience. Downright fucking weird as hell.

Art Blog

 I occasionally post my artwork  with UFO and related themes here on the Orb. I've started a blog that shows all kinds of art work, not just UFO themed. Take a look, and comments are welcome. Thanks!

Regan Lee: Art Blog.