Dreamy Thoughts

Every writer experiences this, I know.  You wake up in the middle of the night with a perfect phrase, plucked out of the vast dreamscape of REM sleep.  You know just how you want to use it, and it's so descriptive, with just the right touch of humor ... oh, it'll slay 'em, no doubt about it.  And you drift off back into dreamland.

In the morning, you go, oh yeah, I came up with that perfect phrase/idea last night.  Now what was it.  Oh yeah, something about a ... something ... and it fit in how?  And where? 

Crapola!

I know writers say *always* keep a pen and paper by your bed and write those things down because you won't remember them in the morning.  But the thought is always so clear, I think I'll remember it.  (I used to have a memory, just can't recall what happened to it in the aging process!)  I should know better. 

I'm not even sure I was wide awake last night when that perfect little analogy came to me.  I can recall the imagery associated with it, just can't recall how the hell I was going to use it exactly.  It'll come to me.  Eventually.  Maybe?  If there's a god out there, I'll remember it some time!

I have written some things down before, and in the morning I can barely decipher them and they're usually so silly they really make no sense at all.  However, I've often gotten some really good things from my dreams.  A perfect (well, I thought so, anyway) opening line for one of my favorite stories, "All That Glitters" published in the Distant Passages Vol. 1 anthology by Double-Edged Publishing (Now available at Amazon.com).  And a perfect image that led to a horror story, soon to appear in Chris Hall's http://chrishall1987.livejournal.com/  Surreal Imaginings #1 from Baysgarth Publications.  That last one should be cool, with stories also appearing by:
Mike Stone  [ http://mylefteye.livejournal.com/ ]
Gerard Brennan [ http://gerardbrennan.livejournal.com/ ]

(Sorry, I don't seem to be able to insert Live Journal name links in here.  Now why would that be I wonder?  Probably something stupid like my firewall software.  Haven't been able to insert pictures into my emails lately either.  grrrrr!  I've been messing with this for way too long now.  I give up.