In this post: my most recent awesome dream; discussion of "new age thinking" and defence of religion in our society; going to Sceptics in the Pub

Dreams are just marvellous, aren't they?

This one was probably sparked off by reading From Hell - Alan Moore's Jack the Ripper novel, which was (so I'm told) turned into a complete hack job of a film, albeit one starring Johnny Depp - just before I went to bed.

It was about school - probably, Ladies College - though in the dream it was the Victorian era (thank you Mr Moore) and the place again resembled grandma's house. The whole thing took place in sickly, muted tones. In any case, in this dream I was two women - one in white, which was quite clearly me (proof of this later), and one in severe black who wasn't me. The woman in black had, as a student, accidentally got pregnant - and to spare herself the shame, had got a maid to hurry the child away and hide him in the Matrix.*

*lesson for uninitiated: the Matrix is made up of the memory of dead Timelords, kinda like the greatest data bank in the universe. But you can actually enter the Matrix, at which point things get very surreal - it's a dream country, governed by no logic but the strongest imagination in there. It didn't occur to me when I picked the comic up, but there's a Valeyard book called "Matrix" in which he becomes Jack the Ripper - oh the joys of the subconscious mind!

This, naturally, doesn't do the child much good - or rather, he grows up pretty interesting. Put a baby in a place where everything you imagine comes true, and the consequences will likely be intense. What I really wanted was to see Alex grow up - could he extend this ability to the real world? What actually happened was the dream jumped forward to the woman in black's death, when she was calling for her son before a room of people who had no idea.

At the same time, I was the woman in white - I had come back to visit the school 30 years after being there. I was having the double experience of seeing it as it had been and seeing it as it was now. Psychoanalysts might want to identify this with the serious sense of distaste I have for what my replacements are doing to my poor old school. There was something terrifying about the place, though - I've come to appreciate the house on which the dream based itself, but as a child it did scare me so perhaps the idea is stuck. I knew that I was going to see something unpleasant in the piano room, I'd known from childhood. And indeed, when I was there I saw myself, aged 11-or-so, come bounding in through the door - also wearing a white Victorian dress. And looking just like me, looking at me with a peculiar expression.

I seem to recall the term "blinovich limitation effect" being used, which somehow dilutes the "Peter Gabriel would write a song about this" effect. Anyway, that's the core of it. I had a wonderfully thereputic dream last night, but I don't think I'm going to talk about it.




Last night, we went to an arty party, Sceptics in the Pub - a friendly but rowdy group who meet up in pub basements, basically to debunk stuff. Students are meant to go to gatherings of bourgeoisie intelligentsia, right? In any case, it felt very much like those groups you hear about pre-Revolution, of well-to-do gents who meet up to talk about stuff.

They're not exactly my lot - at one point, they described themselves as organised scepticism - while I believe as long as you are happy, and as long as what you are doing does not harm either yourself or others, you should be able to do whatever you like, whereas this lot seem to be more focused towards wiping out mumbo jumbo of all descriptions.

I'm quite in touch with my spiritual side, actually - while a great deal of it is utter crap, nevertheless I do believe that thinking positively makes you positive, attribute it to "positive energies" or no. I'm a great fan of visualisation exercises - I don't believe for a second that merely by visualising things, they will come to pass. But by putting yourself in a spiritual state - that is to say, finding an area you feel safe, blocking out distractions, and focusing on your problem - your subconscious mind is bound to start thinking creatively. Or "psychically cleaning" an area - it might be bull, but if you're walking around thinking "this area is psychically clean" it's bound to have a positive effect on your thinking.

It's one of the reasons I'm a great fan of the Tarot. Whenever I have a serious problem, I genuinely consult the cards. I put myself into what believers would call a ritual state - that is to say, cosy clothes and a hot chocolate. The very process of focusing on my question and dealing out the cards gets my juices going. I think about the pictures and the meanings - the fuzzy nature of fortune telling means you can interpret the same card very widely. No, I do not believe the God of Mumbo Jumbo has answered my question. But it encourages me to calm down and think creatively. The Tarot card says my key problem in solving this is actually a lack of progression or risk. Well, is it? And if it isn't, maybe mulling it over will lead me to some other angle I haven't considered. Would I let someone else read my cards? Only for fun - because I believe the interpreting process to be genuinely helpful, not that they themselves contain mystical power from on high.

I also believe that places hold power - Ellis Island Immigration Centre, one of the nastiest places I've ever visited, had something just horrible emanating from the very walls. Even though I recognise the illogicality of it, I do believe that places have memories as much as people. I've started to wonder whether there's some deeper reason why my house and the Maughan Library unsettle me. And on the flipside, there are some places you go - particularly natural places or religious buildings - and they too seem to have power. One place which comes to mind is a waterfall in New Zealand - we went on a long walk on a muggy day, had to climb across a swing bridge, and venture up through rocks and mossy trees. The whole place was just magic - it's what religious scholars call a numinus (Latin: divine power), and it's basically a word which means "having a religious experience".

I might even investigate a new age religion properly, if I had the time, the staying power, and could work out which of my atheist friends and my Christian friends would be more alarmed. It's a question Iacomus asked me on the evening - would I rather people were living in a fantasy and happy or realistic and enlightened? I went for the former, naturally, and was probably the only person in the pub who would have.


In any case, I kept my mouth shut, and it was fantastic. A rowdy room of non-believers and intellectuals, and a single speaker from Boston speaking on "Women's Intuition and other Fairytales" - about think-yourself-happy scams, "the mommy instinct" and the damaging effect Oprah Winfrey has on the female psyche. Great fun stuff - from the notion that mothers "just know" what is best for their children, to retreading that whole indigo children thing. Which I always thought was crapola - all parents think their children are the most wonderful things in the world, and your little Timmy being a starchild from Witch Mountain is just one cut above Shona getting her Julian the lead role in the school play.

As noted before, there was an angle from which I disapproved - I like having these things in the world, so I can test them and come to a conclusion, and I don't think it's fair for a large group which hasn't tested it to mock, no matter how hilariously daft it all is. And I do in part believe some of it - think positively that you will get a porche, you might not actually get one; but at least you will be thinking positively. The chief argument I had with it was the idea that people would "put their creative energies" towards a goal and sit down and wait, instead of actually working for it. I doubt anyone would give up on their dream and wait for it to be presented to them - and the knowledge that they are going to achieve it through psychic means is an incredible boost of confidence. I know people who have been ill, and healed through the power of prayer. A sceptic's response would be "that's total B.S.", but I think that's unfair - even if you don't believe that God had a helping hand, the fact the patient believed in the prayers must be very powerful on a psychological level, even if you rule out a spiritual one. This isn't about whether there is/isn't a God - it's about whether religion and spirituality have a place in our world, a question to which I would say "emphatic yes". When used incorrectly, this sort of thing can start wars and cause pain - but that's the way of the world. Food is a necessity till it goes off, when it is fatal; electricity makes our lives possible, but still causes deaths; the concept of "freedom" has been responsible for all sorts of atrocities, yet we wouldn't live without it.

Thus so spirituality. The sceptic says, "when they pray for that patient and he dies anyway, they'll say it's part of God's plan - they've got an answer for everything!". To which I say, how much of a comfort is it to accept that a God, who you trust, has taken your friend for good reason - than to be told it was some unlucky gene, some freak occurance, or cruel accident. One may be right and the other wrong - but there's no denying that one is going to help you cope far more than the other. Religion and new-age-crap have a very powerful place in our society.

Yet the speech was still fun, well argued and informative, and the audience quick with banter and contributions. It should probably say something about Calypso that she asked a question.

And the afterparty was fun too - we hobnobbed, and met some people Iacomus told me were famous, not that I recognised any of them. Famous columnists and the like. One in particular you could tell was famous - the charisma smacked you from across the room. When the group of us got talking - well, Iacomus and Calypso were doing the talking really, I wasn't feeling very witty and charming yesterday evening - you could instantly tell why he was a celebrity and we weren't. Did he remind me of Dorian Gray? Or was it Paul McGann? The very fact I was comparing him to hot people who he didn't even vaguely resemble in the cold light of day means I probably had a crushette. Which was swiftly rectified when he offered to buy us a round, and when I said I was OK, he commented with the distinct implication I was way too young for alcohol.

Which was something of a bucket of cold water. I didn't correct him.

Who else? A member of the green party who had a great cat badge. A comedian who Iacomus was also very excited about, and who I also didn't recognise. A non-suicidal guy (running joke, don't ask) Spirita made friends with, whose friend is intending to open a prog bar, and is told he looks a bit like Peter Davison ("You don't" I replied on reflex, and then shut up for the next ten minutes hoping it hadn't sounded too cruel and dismissive). Iszi Lawrence, comidienne and podcaster, who also has the coolest hair in the universe.

Also, David Tennant's little brother. Probably. Well, he looked uncannily similar.

I will certainly go again next month.

Finally, parents, if you've heard about the "squat in Peckham" incident, I want to reiterate that I definitely wasn't there, it had nothing to do with me.