At first I was outside picking up trash and observing items people had left behind. The shape, feel and the more abstract qualities of the items came to mind. These abstractions posed no problems for my mind. Then, as I went inside, I needed to ring up a customer. She was a pleasant woman, sort of plump with glasses. I remember that she had two large sandwiches, four small ones and a few other items. (The other items sort of faded away). Now comes the disturbing part. The machines that add up the prices wouldn�t work. At first I tried to fix the machines, but not in any technical sort of way. It was as if I were trying to will them to work. The attempt was unsuccessful. So I tried to figure the total of the sandwiches in my head. But for some strange reason, by mind would not and could not come up with an answer. The only progress I made was to realize (but with difficulty) that the prices were $1.69 for each large one and $1.39 for each small one.
While dreaming, my mind could not even fathom a guess as to the total. I could begin by lining up the numbers, but found no accomplishment in coming up with an answer. I turned to a calculator to help me, but I could only punch the numbers in. It would not work otherwise. I also turned to an adding machine, noting that the keys were easier to punch, but it was smashed with broken glass over the keys and it would not work either. For what seemed like about 15 to 20 minutes I earnestly sought the total of the prices with no success. Then I woke up.
Now, when I woke up I calculated in my head, although slowly, that the total was $8.94. This took some ten seconds. And the more I thought of it the more certain I had become. So why could I not do this in my dream? Well, to try to understand this I look a bit at what I have come to know about the brain. In my understanding, our left hemisphere deals primarily with the higher brain functions. Language, mental cognizance and things such as mathematics. If I remember correctly this is the center of reasoning and cognitive understanding. The right brain supposedly is the seat of creativity, symbolism, some sensory perceptiveness and abstract reasoning. So I look at the dream again. It has helped me to come to these postulations.
1. The left brain may remain somewhat dormant during sleep and dreaming.
2. The conscious mind may primarily associate with the left brain.
3. The subconscious mind may associate more with the right brain.
This would seem to make sense as I was noting the ways in which I dealt with the problems in my dream. While picking up the trash I had focused on the shape, feel and the more intangible aspects of the items, never thinking once what they items themselves were. And in dealing with the problem of adding the sandwich prices, I could not add the numbers, but came up with many different and creative ways to find the answer. Including writing each price on a piece of paper as if solving the problem by line addition. But when it came to the point of computation, my mind would not do it. I think of other dreams where math has entered the picture and it was always the same. So now, knowing these things, perhaps I can try to find a way for both aspects of my mind to meet in my dreams and function more as one instead of seeming to be jealous of one another.
~FIN
