It’s been a little while since I’ve posted. I’m not abandoning this adventure I’ve embarked on here. In fact, I have a small pile of papers with scribbles of half-composed entries for this blog just waiting for me to finish them. Between starting a new day job just over two weeks ago—which has consumed more than its fair share of my brain space—visiting family last week, and my own recent attempts to be a little more social than I’m generally comfortable with, I haven’t devoted the time to finishing something for my little corner of the internet.

I hope to have two, maybe three, book reviews ready to post in the next few weeks—that third one will depend on how fast I read the book; my reading time has suffered severely in the last month or so—and maybe some more thoughts on various TV shows that I’m trying to find time to watch as well.

It’s late here, and maybe no one will read this, but I want to talk to you about dreams.

We all have them, whether we remember them or not. I remember many of mine, and I often write pieces that I remember into my journal so I will have them somewhere. I’m a semi-lucid dreamer. That is, I almost always know that I’m dreaming and because of this have some control over the dream. But a lot of the time I like to let my subconscious go where it wills, because it often produces things that I use in my writing.

Of my current projects—the things I’m either actively working on, or at least generally tinkering with—two have been taken directly from things my brain has conjured as dreams. Sometimes I’m even able to put together separate dreams: last night I had a dream that I think will combine well with a dream I had in high school that I have kept in the “Pieces” folder in my documents. Other things filter in—inspirational songs, pictures, or just general things I want to try that might fit the project—but the basis comes from the surreal creations that my subconscious offers me nightly.

I love this aspect of being a creative. The places we find inspiration are as varied as writers themselves are, and while I’m generally drawn to the lyrical—four or five pieces I’ve written have been inspired by songs—I find that my dreams are a close second in that tally. Partially because they’re visual, which helps with description, but also because dreams are so often comprised simply of raw knowledge and emotion.

Part of what I strive for in my writing is the evoke an emotion within the reader, or to create an aesthetic or atmosphere that the reader can immerse themselves in for a little while. My subconscious does this to me every night: conjuring emotions for whatever part I might play this time, creating a world with air that I must breathe, and summoning characters who are as real in my dreams and I wish to make them for my readers. The struggle, of course, is to bring to the page what is already in my mind. And that’s a struggle I love.

And so I wish you all the best of dreams: the ones that you wish might last forever, the ones that leave you waking with a smile on your face, the ones that inspire.