Sometimes when I am writing a journal entry (or for that matter a letter or an email) I will write quite a bit and then sweep back through, delete it all, and start over. I have often wondered if this is self censorship, but I don’t really think of it that way. The process of writing allows me to order my thoughts, so often I will write the first draft of something and in writing the first draft I will have reordered my thoughts in a why I find either more meaningful or more esthetically pleasing. This entry is a classic example of a rewrite.
I want to tell you about two dreams I had. The first was a very ordinary dream and the second was an erotically charged dream. The outer framework of both dreams was essentially very simple.
The Dream of Parmesan Cheese
I dreamt of a woman I know. She was teaching a class that I was auditing. I had slipped into the classroom once the class was underway. She was in front of the class at two very large tables that were covered with cheese. As I sat and listened the subject of the dream class, the subject that she was teaching, was parmesan cheese. She was teaching how to make parmesan cheese, how to tell the types apart, how to store and package the cheese and how to market the cheese. The class was very detailed and she was obviously passionately engaged in her subject. She knew cheese. I was called away from the class and had a last image of her animatedly teaching in the front of the class.
The Dream Of The Threesome
I dreamt of a woman I know. I was at a party at her apartment, high up in an apartment building. As the evening was winding down I was making my way to the door to leave. There was a couple ahead of me – a stocky man and a lean blonde woman, neither of whom I knew. I lingered while they said goodnight to the hostess. The blonde told her boyfriend to go ahead and bring the car around. He left and she lingered, talking with the hostess. The hostess acknowledged me and I stepped up to say my goodnights. She asked me if I had a moment, to which I replied yes. She told me that her friend’s boyfriend was leaving on a trip and that the two of them were planning on having an intimate party the next night. They were wondering if I would be willing to join them. Though the conversation was innocuous the implication was not – the implicate was that the party would be very intimate and that I would join them in a threesome. This was evident in inflection and body language. I accepted. As I left and walked down the street I passed the boyfriend, sitting in the car, waiting. I felt a flash of guilt and an inner twinge of excitement.
The Striking Thing Was
To me, the striking thing that occurred to me as I awoke for the set of dreams was the role change. The woman in the first dream was definitely someone I have considered as a sexual partner. The woman in the second dream was definitely someone I had not considered as a sexual partner. Of course our desires run deep and are often hidden from ourselves, sometimes for our own good. I am sure I have lusted after both women, but one I have nurtured and the other I have suppressed, which may of course have been the purpose of the dream, since dreams are often about our subconscious desires manifesting.
I am still mulling it around in my brain of course, pondering the meaning, and it dawns on me that there may be a very simple meaning.
Censorship
Since I started the online journal I have censored myself on several occasions – written entries that were never posted. I am confident that it was the right thing to do, but I have been, periodically, mulling around thoughts of censorship. How we censor. What we censor. Why we censor.
A conversation with anther friend of mine the other day is what prompts me to write this portion of the entry. When we go through the act of creating, whether it is writing, photography, music, fine art, or street art we do struggle with our own inner censor. I know I certainly do. For me it is a balancing act between wanting to be as open and honest as I can and a strong desire to neither hurt or embarrass someone else. I’ve talked about it with a variety of people in a variety of mediums, mulling it around, trying to move it to the place where I have a comfortable sense of it.
What several of my friends have pointed out is that I have no control over how people react to what I write – nor should I be worried aboutit. As long as I am not setting out to write something deliberately malicious, I should write as openly and fearlessly as I can. So, I will give that a try. The one area I am going to continue to censor myself though is in the arena of names. I may use pseudonyms or initials or just a generic gender designation. In this manner, I think I can tell the tales I want to tell, speak of the things I want to speak of, and yet allow others the dignity of their anonymity.
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