I breathe through the dream world for nine hours straight. I emerge gaping with the thick restoration of sleep. A powerful wonder drug, the substance manicures our lawns but only after allowing us to fully, deeply, and in a satisfying way, go all akimbo. The jungle within chirps and whirrs with life, yet we emerge simpler, less harangued by all the things unthought, the dreams undreamed. We emerge wet, our feet squishing in rubber-soled pool shoes, ready for the hot tub. It can feel as though we’ve not fully left the realm of the unconscious. That we wear it instead like a worsted jacket that’s thick and comfortable.

I timidly hand my subconscious the mic, in case she’s not done sharing the tapestry from my dreams, a running commentary on my brother, nature, animals, people, the arts, dance, and even sex and relationships.

She laughs and sticks her tongue out at me. I know better than to think she’d deign use fowl language. But why not? If the river of our interests and our sexuality run like an electric current through everything else, why not also our subconscious? What is the symbolism of my bobbing Yorkshire Gold teabag in the cup my friend Dale made us? Why did she ask for money on Facebook last night when we were searching for our Sarah J. Mass audiobook? There, on the refrigerator, Christopher’s art soars through the penmanship lines of the paper he’s harnessed. The working creative mind may be the most worthy thing in existence, no more or less succulent or magic than a flower on magic mushrooms.

I think about the light rising and want to give up. I shake that off and continue to create. I dodge despair like the minefields in my inbox, news of the day so bad it would wake those in coffins, our grandfathers who fought against fascism in WWII. And I just live anyway, go on like it’s my oyster, my morning, which in fact, it is.

I read about Aldous Huxley and Humphry Osmond coming up with the name Psychedelics, which means mind manifesting, in Michael Pollen’s book How to Change your Mind, and I’m struck by their hutzpah as inventors. They decided to create, to write, they believed in themselves and their ideas and they had the (Balls? Bravado? Privilege?) to believe they could just invent things, write things, create worlds, name names. It gives me new understanding that those (usually white men) who created the social reality we call reality were just men. And that this tapestry moves. It shimmers. It is anything but stagnant. And that is why all the mind control through fighting DEI, through Fox media and the right-wing purchasing of all the top channels but one. Rachael Maddow out there as the lone truth teller making her voice heard to millions, in last place but placing. We will not go. We instead will reinvent the world anew at will, at least I hope we will. I got on Fox News yesterday and was so horrified and stunned by their version of reality that it’s taking time for me to recover. We influence each other. It’s difficult to resist. We need truth serum such as psychedelics, such as a direct relationship with both Nature and God, and we need each other also to keep speaking truth with or without a microphone so that even someone walking by us hears. Because if enough of us tune out of the mainstream and turn on the river of light that made us, we cannot and will not be ruled.

But I see Fox news now as both powerful and toxic. Because of my open mind. Because I couldn’t believe they were really trying to link anyone protesting this illegal, baseless war with Iran as a communist. Why would ANYONE support this war? Like 100 percent of us ought to be protesting. And they know that. It’s sinister.

So we take a deep breathe to calm the rise of anxiety. Because they can’t win. They’re wrong. And the light always wins.

A golden rule: the best way to awaken others is to stay awakened ourselves. Stay woke. Never go back. We got this. Fuck if I know how. Stay in the saddle. Stay centered. Feel the Earth and the plants breathe. Know, feel, trust, and believe.

The best is coming, yes, and we are the inventors, the cosmic creators, who usher it in, moment my moment with the social reality we envision, envision, envision hard until we all walk right into our new home.