The ever-present, overwhelming evil
From my journal, 1/21/2024:
“The nightmares had been quiet for some time, but started back up in December, and increased in frequency and intensity of disturbing emotions and emotional pain….I’d had nightmares for decades. Mostly memories of the abuse itself….But over the last few years two new versions started up, one worse than the other….SNAKES – copperheads and cobras. Always those – venomous, threatening.
The nightmare always started the same — it was always at night – always just one tiny snake lurking in the background. Sometimes it was a tiny one in a dark corner of my bedroom. Other times it was one tiny snake lurking in the back corner of my bureau drawer, tucked under and behind my sweaters.
And always, whenever I approached that drawer, I would tell myself, ‘Just be careful. Don’t draw its attention – if I’m careful, the snake won’t notice me, and it will leave me alone. I can get what I need and avoid it.’ In my dreams, I accepted this as normal reality. That was how it was there – I just needed to use cautious co-existence, and “maybe” it would all be okay? At least I thought that in the dream. But it really wasn’t so, because the snake was always there and I NEVER really felt safe.
Then the dream would progress the same way every time. Co-existence became impossible because the snake would swell, get very large… and then start multiplying…hundreds, then thousands of them. They were always there, filling that bureau drawer, getting more dangerous by the moment. I didn’t know where they might move to. Or when they might strike.
Finally, they overtook the whole drawer, spilling out of it and onto the floor. Very quickly they would cover the entire floor, then my whole room and finally cover my bed, and me, until they were all over me and I was overwhelmed. Each time, I had no escape, not one bit of space for me. Their mouths would open, fangs about to clamp down on me….and then I would wake up in a cold sweat…
(more…)
