Dream

I remember parts of a dream last night.

I was enrolled in some kind of college.
There was a championship game between UNC and the Vols (UT),
but I can't remember what the sport was;
I think it was basketball, though I don't remember seeing them play.
I recognized one of the UNC players and wondered why.
Perhaps I had seen his face earlier in my dream.

Earlier I was supposed to be doing my assignments.
I wrote them down in a black notebook,
but never got them accomplished.

We were seated in a big auditorium where some kind of choral number was to be performed.
I had the notebook in my hand as I walked down the steep stairs on one side,
dodging people who were sitting on the stairs.
Then when I got to the bottom of the stairs, I realized my notebook was gone,
so I went back up to try and find it,
but of course there were many others like it,
and I remember thinking that I should've put my name on the outside.

Earlier in the dream I was supposed to help fill in a big hole in the middle of a path in the woods.
Something had been removed from it, causing a large depression right where people would be walking.
With someone else's help, I was moving dirt from a nearby pile to fill in the hole.
I noticed a wheelbarrow and thought that would help.
But nightfall came, and we had to stop.
The next day I found the whole place was covered with water - maybe 3 or 4 feet.
So we had to wait until the tide went out before we could resume our work.

All during the dream I remember thinking that there was something I should be doing,
but I wasn't getting it done.
This is a familiar feeling for me.
I was the world's worst procrastinator in college,
leaving important work until the last possible minute.
But starting each semester with the full determination to "turn a new page."

I also do that at work now.
I create little emergencies for myself
by waiting to do important tasks until the last minute,
sometimes being late.
Then always rescuing myself with a heroic effort.
But always knowing that I could have done much better.

I know this tendency to sabotage myself comes from somewhere deep inside me.
I can't explain why I do it.
It never has any value.
It always causes me pain in the long run.

This was present even in my elementary school years,
when I was always recognized for having great potential,
but never living up to it.

Maybe that's the message here.
My parents berated me for not living up to my potential,
and I took that message to heart.
I believed them.

Then there was my retarded sister,
who was always excused from any duties
and rarely punished as I was.

So I always had to live with the knowledge
that I had all this potential and never lived up to it,
whereas my poor sister was born with a deficit
and could not be expected to live up to anything.

Was I punishing myself in some way?
Why did I do that,
and why do I still do it?

It's one of those abiding mysteries about myself
that I'm continually trying to unravel.

Maybe the dream was a reminder of that issue.
As I sit here in the office with my taxes undone,
knowing that I should be working on them instead of blogging.

See how it works?