December 15th, 1998– I had a dog dream again. -Haven’t had one in years. The dogs are always black. The dogs are always nasty, and they always win. They usually attack in packs. My run-ins with them have always been very unpleasant. They are among my most frightening aspects in dreamworld. I have a history with these beasties it would be interesting to relate. The last dream I had with one was in December 1991. -Holy Shit. That was a long time ago. In it there was only one black dog, but he was the big daddy of all black dogs. He carried the impression of the Hound of Baskervilles. In that dream he had come for my next sibling, Gaelan, the oldest of the boys, because he had been given his scent. I spent the whole dream trying to stave him off, but he was indomitable. The end of the dream had him breaking into our home, which should have been a protective sanctum. (To give you an idea of the protectiveness of my home, in real life, I once had a friend named Joe who asserted that he could sense demons. He had streets in Victoria where he said the demons were very strong. He said he could sense them in some homes. Joe said that the first time he came to our house, he could sense demons everywhere, roiling in the air, surrounding our house at nearly 100-m, the span of the entire block. But as soon as he stepped in the door, there were none. The place was totally pure and had a sense of heaven. That was in the early, early 90s.)
There was no way of stopping the Hound of Baskervilles from getting inside of our house in the dream. He leapt in through the window. In that dream we had managed to escape him over and over, and golly that was a first. But we could not stave him off.
In my dreams I have been attacked, usually out in the woods, with children in my company as I tried to get them home. Once one appeared and circled me while I was working outdoors. I snarled at it because I knew it was an enemy. I was also testing a theory since I knew these creatures fed on fear. (-Didn’t work.) It immediately leapt for me and I awoke gasping, knowing its jaws had been an inch from cracking my skull. He leapt at me from behind.
So last night it was the big daddy, the hound of Baskervilles. I was out doing research on Garry Oaks with Melinda (we had been up in the tree canopy), and when we were down and finished he came hopping over a log. I sort of went, Oh shit. I hope this isn’t like the last one. (Should have stayed up in the tree for this dream . . .) But I know it’s gonna be the same because when I register him with recognition, the bastard is curling his lips back over his teeth and beginning a low snarl. Yup, here we go again. He circles and attacks from behind; the dream closes with his jaws on my arm. There is something about the dogs that strikes you as keenly conscious, they are not like the bogeys of your own subconscious. They are keenly aware, appear to read minds, and react very quickly.
So last night, the big daddy of these bastards invaded my tranquil dream. Not only that, he invaded every single successive dream I had that night. It was like he recognized my number and knew he hated my guts, that he had met an enemy rather than a victim, and he made it his personal mission to ruin my night. Like all the dreams before, there was no way of winning. In every dream he invaded, the dream ended as he caught and devoured me. Furthermore, the dreams kept getting closer and closer into inner sanctums, places that should be safe, not outdoors or in the wilds. The bastard clearly had it out for me. He would not leave me alone. I awoke that morning at 7:30 a.m. feeling quite disturbed that this bogey was back, and had had his way with me all night, about four times. I found it alarming. That morning, as it has been for the last several mornings, my body launched into thought. I figure I’m losing one hour before sleep, and one hour each morning, to thought right now. This morning I forced myself to go to sleep again, and I’m very glad I did, because it was the first time I’ve slept in in days and I went back to dreaming. I didn’t think that could be managed. I’m very glad too, that this thing was resolved, because if I had woken up having been four times devoured, which is the similar sum to all the times I’ve been attacked by these creatures before, I would have been a little disturbed.
In the last dream I was at home. Only the siblings were there, we lived in the upper story of a traditional 1900s house, and the children were very young, around their ages in 1987. It is near to Christmas. I was upstairs and I heard the children unsuspectingly let the hound in by the front door. He’s gotten into the house. It should have been a peaceful dream. I hear him coming up the stairs, I flee into a large room and open the window. It’s raining outside, and there is a tiled ledge outside the window, less than three feet wide and slanted steeply down. I step out onto it; I’m about to close the window when I decide on an avenue of defense. The hound is in the room and he leaps out the window onto the ledge. I don’t know where the piece of wood came from. Every time they have attacked me I’ve had nothing at hand. This time I had a piece of wood that tapered into jagged sharpness at one end. When the beast opened his maw, I shoved it down his throat as far as his intestine. In doing so I shoved him off the roof, a fall of two stories. Holy shit. That killed him. The beast is dead. If he ever was a person, who did that to people in their dreams, I hope he knew the pain of it. I like the feeling of knowing they will never be back again.
I have been attacked by black dogs twice in real life. I have a scar two inches long on my arm from the first one. The second one was bluffing. Both leapt for my left arm. Don’t ask me why.