Had a dream that I was gonna get killed and raped.
It was some older dude that had been watching me for some time. My openness made it easier for him to see. He was beginning to perceive I was gay. Something happened and he finally chose to reveal himself by shoving a knife or gun in my back.
I hadn’t really noticed him till then but he confessed he had wanted a total intimate relationship with me and felt maybe there was a chance I had been calling to him in secret through my actions and words.
His intense watching of me coupled with the strength of his desires blinded him from genuinely seeing me and instead it caused him to give his own meaning to every little action I made that actually had nothing to do with him at all. He must have realized upon approaching me that I might not be interested and so he resolved to kill me and rape me after I was dead (power). And he told me this was his intention. He came up on me from the back right in the middle of the whole crowd and cohorts that surrounded me (including kids that were going to camp). But he gave me the opportunity to speak to him about my choice (to get with him or die).
In this moment I knew that I had to be the most honest I’ve ever been and make him understand why I would respond with a no.
I also knew that as I spoke I had to come to terms with the way I was gonna be killed and that it was his choice (I didn’t even think of fighting or running, I don’t know why not).
It was a total average night in the sky, in the world and with all the people around me. No one was noticing what was going on between him and I. A friend came up and spoke with me right quick but still didn’t notice anything was wrong. Partly because they weren’t looking or paying attention, but the other part because I was fully staying with the guy in mind, body and spirit with no effort to betray his engagement with stupid winky or hinty behavior to the friend. I had resolved that maybe I’d make an art piece that would tell the story of what happened while I was speaking with him so that later a friend could see what had happen (I also thought about all the books of reflection that the people would then look into). I knew I had an opportunity to be very real in telling him the truth but also completely include him in my world/life and not reject him as a person even though I was rejecting his intimacy. I had high hopes that if I was unlike all the rest of the people in the world and still accept him as a person in such an intense moment where he could feel my genuine connection that he would understand the nature of my interest in women thereby letting me go to live my life.
I was preparing to have this talk with him, I was setting my heart and intentions this way but then I woke up.
Upon waking I realized three very important messages to take from the dream.
First, that there is very, very real danger out there that can come upon me if I choose to continue to take down boundaries or engage with the boundary people as equally as if boundaries don’t exist.
Two, that my effort to be very real and honest with the dude in hopes he would feel a realness from me probably still wouldn’t affect his intention to kill me.
Three, that realness I was seeking to show him IS something I can exhibit in my day-to-day life EVEN while maintaining boundaries (and factually this is what I’m doing as anyone who knows me knows I’m not very chatty about myself or about others, even though still quite friendly).
It is not my job to help other people out of their delusions, only to help myself out of mine. Also what’s interesting about the dream is that there was some part of me that was so at peace with myself that I was accepting and coming to terms with death right then and there the way those jumpers from the world trade center had to do as they were falling.