Dreams of Inadequacy

I didn't get to bed until 4am last night, mostly owing to some night shift work at the data center.

Nearly as soon as I drifted to sleep, I had a strange dream which woke me up again almost immediately.

I was somehow back in northern Ontario, visiting my old elementary school. Charlton Public School had barely 70 students when I graduated from grade 8; some 15 years ago, the building itself was sold and remade into a furniture factory. Still, in my dream, the building appeared as it was back in my day.

Everyone I ever knew at that school have long since retired and/or passed away so not unexpectedly all of the teachers were new to me.

Because it was raining the day of my visit, the kids couldn't go outside for recess at lunchtime. Instead, all of them were in the basement gym square dancing, and the principal was the square dance caller. That was kinda neat --there was no school-centered square dancing when I attended years ago-- but then I noticed: all of these 7 & 8 year old kids were dancing C3B while I can barely dance C2!

To say that I suddenly felt like a complete failure was an understatement.

When I commented to the principal/caller that I thought his dance program was really cool and that I call & dance in the greater DC area, he handed me the microphone and asked me to call a tip. I called my hardest C1, my normally highest calling level, judiciously throwing in a handful of C2 calls where possible. I called stuff which would normally guarantee crashing a floor at home but these kids handled it with ease.

When the tip was done, the kids were appropriately polite but I could see the look in their eyes: That's the best you can do? C'mon, give us something at least a little difficult, loser!

That's when I woke up.

At the best of times, I'm acutely aware of my own shortcomings and failures but having my subconscious launch a full frontal attack like this was more than a bit disturbing.


Go ahead... ask me anything!

Dreams of Inadequacy

I didn't get to bed until 4am last night, mostly owing to some night shift work at the data center.

Nearly as soon as I drifted to sleep, I had a strange dream which woke me up again almost immediately.

I was somehow back in northern Ontario, visiting my old elementary school. Charlton Public School had barely 70 students when I graduated from grade 8; some 15 years ago, the building itself was sold and remade into a furniture factory. Still, in my dream, the building appeared as it was back in my day.

Everyone I ever knew at that school have long since retired and/or passed away so not unexpectedly all of the teachers were new to me.

Because it was raining the day of my visit, the kids couldn't go outside for recess at lunchtime. Instead, all of them were in the basement gym square dancing, and the principal was the square dance caller. That was kinda neat --there was no school-centered square dancing when I attended years ago-- but then I noticed: all of these 7 & 8 year old kids were dancing C3B while I can barely dance C2!

To say that I suddenly felt like a complete failure was an understatement.

When I commented to the principal/caller that I thought his dance program was really cool and that I call & dance in the greater DC area, he handed me the microphone and asked me to call a tip. I called my hardest C1, my normally highest calling level, judiciously throwing in a handful of C2 calls where possible. I called stuff which would normally guarantee crashing a floor at home but these kids handled it with ease.

When the tip was done, the kids were appropriately polite but I could see the look in their eyes: That's the best you can do? C'mon, give us something at least a little difficult, loser!

That's when I woke up.

At the best of times, I'm acutely aware of my own shortcomings and failures but having my subconscious launch a full frontal attack like this was more than a bit disturbing.


Go ahead... ask me anything!