Dreaming up an idea

Yesterday, Jeffe Kennedy. a twitter pal, wrote a really interesting post about dreaming over at the Word Whores group blog. (I know. Great name for a blog, isn't it?)

[Aside: TG just asked me if I had my post up yet. I told him I was working on it right now. He said, "Ha! Just like I used to do in college all the time -- I'd be sitting outside the classroom door, writing my paper right before it was due." Uh, yeah, honey. Only I don't think I can flunk "blog."]

Anyway, back to Jeffe's post. When I was procrastinating over a Manhattan with TG last night, I had a brilliant thought (surprising how often that happens over drinks). If I didn't get a post written (I didn't), maybe an idea would come to me in a dream.

And it did!

(Not that I was terribly worried. If it hadn't, I was just going to claim I was taking the day off in honor of MLK's birthday. It's always good to have a backup plan.)

But here's what I dreamed: I was sitting by a pool in the courtyard of some fancy-schmancy hotel, at a table, my laptop open in front of me. I was writing a blog post about how much I was enjoying the anticipation of getting into the pool. In that post, I speculated that I was enjoying the anticipation even more than I would likely enjoy the actuality. That the idea of swimming in the luxury hotel's fancy-schmancy flower-shaped pool was better than diving in and getting wet.

Frankly, I have a very accommodating imagination, and it tends to skip over stuff like getting chlorinated water in my nose, which I loathe, and that, luxury pool or not, the water is probably colder than I like it (think bathtub temperature). In my imagination, the pool dip is a sublime thing, a sensual experience akin to a full-body massage performed by one of my cabana boys.

(Oh, my God! I'll bet that isn't nearly as good as my imagination, either! What a revolting thought.)

Anyway, when I woke up this morning, I thought, Ah-ha! Jeffe was right. My dream* did provide me with what I needed -- blog fodder. Such as it is.

So, how about you? Do you enjoy anticipation? Or is it all about the real for you?

*Honest to God, I really did have this dream last night. Right before the one where I looked out the window and saw a little girl walking through my front yard with a dark brown deer and miniature horse. Only I couldn't think of a blog post about that one.