Scribbles from a Scribe

I finally got around to watching the movie "Inception" recently, and came away mightily impressed.

It's a compelling movie that I expect to do well come Oscar time next spring. Some might call it a flight of fancy...one close friend of mine called it a "mind @#$@#"...and I'm sure it would be classified as a fiction film.

But there's more than a germ of authenticity to it.

I have learned through years of massage and cranio-sacral therapy that the body stores memories not just in the brain but in muscles as well, and that with the proper techniques those memories can be revived and released. In fact, that can be a key part of the recovery process.

My brother Marvin, who is a massage therapist, talked of working on a woman who had been in an automobilie accident in her past, and when he began working on a shoulder that had been injured in the crash she began crying --- not in physical pain, she said, but from reliving the vivid memories of the accident itself that suddenly flashed into her mind.

I also recall dreams that were incredibly vibrant and turned out not to be flashbacks, but flash forwards --- snapshots of events that had not yet unfolded. Those are rare, yet I can't be the only person to have had them.

And there was one night when I woke from a dream in which I was having a dream...though I had no idea what that "inner" dream was after I awakened.

All of which serves to remind me that we as humans have barely begun to tap into what our minds and bodies are capable of.

And it also may be why it was not hard for me to follow "Inception" through its muliple layers of story-telling, which had me thinking 3D without the funky glasses.

I won't go into the plot much, so I don't spoil it for those who have yet to see it. But it would be fair to say the plot revolves around a small group that attempts to bore into the recesses of memory to achieve a desired result....and the effort goes awry.

When you walk out, you wonder how much of what you just saw was real, how much was a dream - and how much of it is actually possible.

I suspect the answer to the last piece is...far more than we may realize - or want.

Every once in a while I come across a story to which my reaction is, "And the 'experts' didn't already know this?????"

That happened again last week, when a national story reported that a good night's sleep or a 'hard nap' improved test scores or proved inspirational in solving a vexing problem for the person who slept.

And in other news, sunrise comes in the morning.

I've lost count of the number of times I went to bed wrestling with the lead for a story (or simply what to say to a friend struggling with a problem) and awakened the next morning with the problem solved.

Dad never went to college, let alone get an engineering degree, yet he built more than a dozen bridges across the Sawmill Creek on our farm so the wheels of an irrigation pivot system could safely cross the creek bed. No two bridges were the same. Each had unique length, angle and track issues. Yet Dad figured each one of them out --- often by sleeping on it. Several times he mentioned how he awoke one morning with answers that came to him in his sleep.

I'm no sleep scientist. But I suspect this happens because while we sleep, the brain can devote resources that might be otherwise deployed to handle the daily business of distractions and duties to the pressing problem of the day (or night, as it were). A similar scenario may be how doctors will place a critically injured patient into a medically induced coma so the body can devote more energy toward healing by minimizing other needs.

Despite this "official" confirmation that sleep helps us work through challenging problems, I seriously doubt this means an editor's going to give me the green light if I say, "I'm struggling with this story; I need to go home and take a nap."

It's a nice thought, though.

I had a rather vivid dream last night. I was among a group of people helping a friend clean out her garage in rural Butler County when I happened to glance out the open garage door and notice a large tornado on the ground.

No one else had said a word, and I was amazed a tornado that big had gotten that close to us without anyone noticing. It was an unattached garage, and her house seemed too far away to go for shelter. I found myself telling people to take cover - but having no idea where they (or even I) should go.

As a last resort, I told people to grab cushions from an old couch pushed against a far wall, and shelter our heads with them after we'd squeeze between the couch and the wall. It wasn't much, but it was about the best I could do.

I woke up before we had hunkered down behind the couch, so I don't know what happened next. With news that tornadoes are possible in southern Kansas on Tuesday, I find myself wondering if it's a premonition of sorts (no, I won't be cleaning anyone's garage tomorrow) or simply a metaphor for something else.

I suppose I could do some dream analysis by tapping into some online resource, but I won't bother. At least not tonight. Sleep beckons, and I wouldn't be surprised if Tuesday's a busy day for me...especially if that forecast proves to be accurate.