Sometimes they were vertical. Sometimes horizontal. I would run past them, hop over them and generally try to stay out of their way. That was my job in those days, apparently. The whole scene was very rhythmic, so I was pretty good about getting through it all. But still, I had these hurdles to get past.

And then, at almost the same exact time I thought they would happen forever, they were gone. Never to return. And I always wondered what they meant.

I used to have these dreams all the time, you see. Very geometrical. Square columns would shoot up and down or side to side, always in a deliberate rhythm. I don't think they were sex dreams--usually sex dreams are more specific. I don't really get turned on by moving columns that resemble, in some ways, to Tetris. But I never played Tetris much at all. Or any other video game during that time--which was college for the most part. I actually play video games rarely, and when I do, one or two rounds is about as much as I can muster.

IIIIIIIIIII
IIIIII
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
IIIIIIIIIIIIII o
III
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

It was something like that, if the I's were solid columns and moving constantly. I am the o.

What does this mean? What was my brain trying to tell me? And why have these dreams never come back since then?

I have been playing drums again, trying to get back into fighting shape. Fighting shape being in condition enough to play hard for an hour or more without coughing up a lung or collapsing. I think it was a lot easier when I was younger. My body wasn't tired at all. It didn't protest and groan and pop when I'd overextended myself. It simply allowed me to do what I wanted to do with little consequence. I must be getting old.

Even though I haven't started having these dreams again, I have a theory these dreams are connected to playing drums. Somehow, this is the subconscious version of my inner rhythm. And trying to keep up with the constant movement is getting in synch with all of that. And so I anticipate a return of something like those recurring dreams of old soon.

Of course, I could be completely wrong about this assumption. There were so many things going on in my life back when the dreams were constant. I could be deluding myself or deciding to solve a long time personal mystery with a rather simple explanation. Which isn't really a wrong thing to do. I mean, who does it affect? No one else has to dream my dreams. If I'm wrong, I just never have the dreams again--just like I haven't had them for ten years or so.

Maybe I just miss the consistency of the dream. I miss knowing that sometime I'll have one of these things--even though occasionally the dreams caused me a bit of anxiety. Not as much as the weird, floaty ghost dreams (which I still have from time to time), but a lot of the time, the only way out of the columns was to wake up. And dreams I have to wake up from usually cause me a bit of anxiety.

So now I've decided to state, unequivocally, that these dreams were about drumming. In turn, once I start having them again, I will be a true drummer. It's a goal. It's something. It's what happens when you obsess a little too much about stuff of little consequence.

Which is fine with me these days. I don't feel like obsessing about the stuff of large consequence the leaders of this world have thrown in front of us lately.

Matt Worley doesn't believe in dream therapy, but he does believe in drumming.