Dream
Story
I
was sitting in a chair with my laptop in front of me. I was writing
down a story based on a dream I had dreamed the previous night. The
setting was today's Helsinki. I remembered all the details clearly.
The story read as follows:
"Having
arranged all the furniture, we needed to tell everyone about our
new address. I took care of the official announcements, informing
the Post and the Population Register Centre, whereas Sari compiled
a list of all our friends and acquintances. She wrote the standard
post cards saying 'We Have Moved To A New Address'.
After
Sari had finished, I checked that all our friends were included.
Comparing the post cards against our address books, I noticed that
my friend Mark had been left out. He should also get the notification
of our new address. I glanced at the postcards again. These were
grey and ugly, available for free from any Post Office. I hadn't
written to Mark for quite some time. Did I really want to send him
such an impersonal notification only?
I
got a better idea. I went into the basement and opened the door
to get into the bicycle storage. I dragged my old bike out and lifted
it up against the wall. I had meant to fix my bike for a long time,
but I had not had the occasion. And I didn't actually intend to,
since I'd rather buy a new one. So now I crouched by the bike and
moved the metallic tire lines into a new position. They turned easily
by simply touching them with my fingers. In this way pointing my
fingers the lines were re-positioned into a form of writing; I wrote
our new address into the tires.
The
result looked great and highly original. I packaged my bike, wrote
the receiver's address on top of it, and mailed it to my friend
in Wales. I was quite happy with the outcome. It was much better
than the free post card for the change of address."
After
I had finished writing the dream story, I read it through carefully.
It seemed OK to me. During the last couple of months I had systematically
written down my dreams. Some of my dreams were so lively in their
own reality that I wanted to get some of that repeated in the form
of writing. There were already dozens of pages of written material.
I
was sitting at the backyard when my mother and my sister came to visit
me. My laptop was still there, so they wanted to read my latest story
right away. Janna took the laptop in front of her and read quietly.
When she had finished, I asked her for an opinion. "These have
become boring," Janna said, "All the stories are so similar.
Anything can happen. You get used to that."
My
mother said the same after she had read the story too. "You need
to take care not to bore the reader. If the stories are only based
on the effect of novelty, then you easily lose the interest."
I
replied that the purpose of these dream stories was not to create
amusement nor to attract with new things. "I write these stories
for myself, for my own record. If they happen to please also other
people, then that's only a positive thing."
Janna
and my mother understood and read my texts again. Janna said she liked
my school story - the one where there was that trial. That contained
some deeper ideas. My mother suggested that maybe I should concentrate
on themes that touched a wider audience. The readers might not be
too interested in my personal fantasies.
After
my folks had left I sat in the garden, submerged in thought, without
paying attention to the wondrous glow of the vegetation. Instead I
glanced my latest story again. I quickly realized that this story
about our new address was exactly the kind of personal fantasy that
my mother had warned about. I hesitated for a moment. Then I clicked
the Delete button. I switched off the computer and went back indoors.
