Rhodri Marsden: Let me tell you about the dream I had last night. Wait… come back!

Life on Marsden

Rhodri Marsden
Tuesday 21 February 2012 01:00 GMT
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I once went out with someone who insisted on telling me her dreams every morning, streams of subconscious hooey about attacking a space wombat with a ladle or something.

To be fair, she did always ask, "Can I tell you my dream?" and I'd say, "Sure," before dozing off as she gave a detailed account of eating canapés on a chimney stack with Rudyard Kipling, except it wasn't Rudyard Kipling because he had the body of a Masai warrior and Steve's head. You know, Steve. From accounts.

If someone asked you if they could tell you a story they'd made up but warned you that it had no narrative structure, was packed with improbable situations and nonsensical dialogue and would end with the words "and then I woke up", you'd say, "No. I'm busy." But it feels rude to say no when people ask if they can recount their dreams – though I've started doing so, regardless. Yeah, I'm railing frantically against a century of Freudian study, but seriously, other people's dreams are total arsecake.

Anyway, I've been having some pretty amazing dreams recently, including one where I spent half an hour on the Northern Line with Stevie Wonder; I don't recall what we discussed but I know he got off at Balham and there wasn't anyone to guide him up the platform, which I found stressful (though clearly not stressful enough to get off the train and help him). In another one Madonna and her entourage turned up to watch my band play in a tiny pub, which caused me a massive administrative headache because there wasn't any room on the guest list and she didn't seem keen on paying to get in.

I've had recurring ones about sitting behind the wheel of a car that won't start, frustrating ones where I'm erroneously implicated in mass executions, another one where a girl asked me, "Do you want to feel the touch of a real woman?" and when I replied, "Yes," she gave me a load of forms to fill in, and a "sex dream" where she ordered me to shout my full name and address repeatedly at her throughout.

You may deduce from this that I'm an anxious chap, but I knew that already. I could have just told you that I'm anxious and then written a column about something else, but it's too late now.

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