I Miss The Comfort In Being Sad

I wake up from this dream and it's 6:14 on Thursday, July 17th, you appeared out of nowhere, we're just “friends” on IG, I sent you a request in March, then I just had 200 followers or something like that (at this time, I have almost 750), and I did it 'cause we met and we spoke at a Sleep Medicine Conference, specifically when we attended a talk on Narcolepsy Type 1 and just as I was asking the lecturer if Sodium Oxybate was available in Mexico the microphone failed, your mentor and you were in the seats in front of me and you said Taking advantage of the break, Dr., I want to tell you that I saw your content on social media and I loved it. Perhaps I said Thanks and asked you if you had attended to my talk earlier that morning, it was Saturday, March 22nd. At 8: 30 I had spoken of Sleep and Metabolism and I had coordinated a Simposium, you said No and I smiled and the technicians fixed the microphone.

That was the last day of the Sleep Medicine Congress, I was more melancholic than usual, since October I'd been looking for full-time permanent academic positions at 6 or 7 seven universities, writing 3 or 4 Research Projects, several Letters of Intent and one paper that was published in February in a Q1 Journal. 

I'd already looked at you, it was impossible not to notice you. In addition to attending the Sleep Medicine Congress, you had participated in a poster session, you had given a talk a day or two before and you had won the first place of a research undergraduate contest. Many scholars had spoken to you, perhaps they were attracted by your clinician research project but also by your youth and your beauty, you must have been in your 20s. 

Besides being more melancholic than usual, I had been tired and sleepy in the entire Sleep Medicine Congress, I'm allergic to air conditioning and I had been exposed to a tons of air conditioning machines. At breakfast and dinner, I had spoken several times with a colleague of my age, he was also looking for a full-time permanent academic position, he had an academic profile similar to mine, we were disappointed, about to quit, to leave academia. 

At some point, when I became aware of your existence, I dreamed about you, the way you seemed to look at me, like if you were frightened or something, like if you wanted to tell me something, and I realized how easy it would be to impress you, and not because of you but because of the way it is, I remembered when I started as a Subject Teacher and students were easily impressed by me, they sort of saw me as a role model. Then, some of them, as the semesters ended, sent me weird e-mails and stuff like that. 

Anyway, the point is that I just dreamed about you, and it's 6:14 on Thursday, July 17th. 

In my dream, we were in my childhood apartment, there was another woman about my age, dunno why but the three of us had some sort of ambiguous relationship. It was early in the morning, we were in the bathroom. As I was brushing my teeth, you took off a bathrobe and you looked at me like if you wanted to tell me something, like if you were frightened or something, and I couldn't stop looking at your naked body, I wanted to feel you in my arms, feel your young and smooth skin, like if you were hungry for me. We kept in silence for a minute or two and then we kissed precisely when the other woman came into the bathroom. As she had some sort of relationship with me, it was awkward. Immediately I felt guilty, I guess she represents some sort of alter ego, how would I feel if I quit academia. 

In the real world, my colleague spoke me on the phone two days ago, he said he finally got a full-time permanent academic position, between March and July I've sent 3 or 4 more applications to 6 or 7 universities, I'm writing another paper, I got a Subject Teacher position at the same university where I started almost 20 years ago –it's like if I started from scratch–, everyone around me seems to get a full-time permanent academic position, I saw Game of Thrones last night, specifically the episode in which Stannis Lannister takes Melisandre on a table, she wore some sort of a bathrobe and she took it off, just like you did in my dream, there are no hidden messages, it is just what it is.

I should be in bed, I'll be sleepy all day long.

And now I'm ready to close my mind

 

As I walk thru an alley, looking for a bathroom, and I leave the university, I feel so relieved. For an entire week I had been obsessively working on my 20-min talk. Since I woke up earlier this morning, all I wanted to do was to give my talk, to end up with this tension and anxiety.

I'm about to enter the bathroom and I'm thinking about the near future in this university. Twenty years ago, I started here as a Subject Teacher, it was my first experience. I also think about the details of my 20-min talk and the interview, from almost two hours ago. I also think on how my colleagues gave me a tour across the university, whether I really have a chance to get a full-time permanent position or if things will continue as usual.

Suddenly a song appears in the middle of the alley, it comes from an invisible speaker hidden in the walls. Three chords from the electric guitar, followed by the bass and the drums, hit my brain. It's a fuzzy guitar, and I know that I've heard this chords a thousand times before but I cannot identify which song exactly is. I vaguely remember a woman singing it, maybe Kim Gordon, but I know this is not a Sonic Youth song nor a Kim Gordon song. Then, a man sings...

«So messed up I want you here

In my room I want you here»

... but I don't recognize the voice, it confuses me even more, I guess I was expecting a different voice but dunno exactly which kind of voice, it's like if I had heard this song a thousand times before and simultaneously for the very first time.

I stop walking and close my eyes, What's the name of this song? I wonder, and try hard to remember. 

It was possible that twenty years ago, when I had my first chance to be a Subject Teacher, I also walked thru this alley and that I also heard this song, maybe this song comes from the Radio Station of the Ibero, twenty years ago they had this Radio Station, it seems that I start from scratch, I will be again a Subject Teacher, but I'm twenty years older, I have an experience of almost 70 undergrad courses and I have published almost 20 papers in peer-reviewed journals, I'm National Researcher Level II. Dunno if this would be my last experience on academia, perhaps I will stop looking for full-time permanent academic positions, but, as Neil Young, more or less, said, music never dies.

I was sitting there in a comfortable chair

I walked out from this dream in which I was simultaneously a PhD student and a young professor teaching a Neuroscience course, the classroom was a big auditorium at the School of Medicine, we were more than 200 students and the place was barely enough for so many students. As a student for some reason I was late and I had to sit between a couple of men in a pretty awkward position. I felt suffocated and anxious and irresponsible. Like if that were not my place in the world.

Dunno why but I had no notebook but a Telecaster. It must have been 9 or 10 o'clock, the auditorium and the students reminded me of my first days as a PhD student in a Neurochemistry course in an auditorium at the Institute of Cellular Physiology, it was humid and hot, just like the weather between summer and autumn. At times, the place also seemed a fancy party hall.

As I felt awkward in this seat between a couple of men, I saw myself in front of the audience, as a professor. I was not exactly myself, but I knew I was the professor, it was some sort of a weird doppelganger. I saw myself as an enthusiastic professor, I looked like this guy performing Matthew Kimble, the brother of the main character of The new adventures of old Christine, maybe he appeared in my dream 'cause I recently saw him on Fargo, his real name is Hamish Linklater, but in my dream he was me and he was not an actor but a neuroscientist, and he was pretty young. He had a few tics, he constantly stuck out his tongue while he spoke and ran his tongue over his upper lips, he looked natural and enthusiastic. He had long, somewhat curly hair. His hair was so pretty. He was wearing a blue long-sleeved Benetton shirt, quite similar to the one I have. I kinda sensed that girls adored him, each time he spoke and ran his tongue over his upper lips and kept sort of freezed for a second or two, looking into infinity, perhaps organizing his thoughts, girls sort of murmured and sighed. The situation was funny, it didn't seem a PhD course, but a bachelor's degree course.

Hamish-myself walked in front of the blackboard with great confidence, and he spoke about the brain and how we have brain circuits for building a pencil and also a spaceship, but he really only touched these topics superficially. He looked pretty happy. He really seemed to enjoy his job.

Somehow, he took us to a place in which neuroscience seemed so cool and important, but, as I mentioned, he only touched these topics superficially. Nonetheless, the audience looked satisfied. At a point, he gave us a brief recess in which he took a marmalade sandwich or something like that, he said he hadn't had breakfast. Suddenly Hamish neuroscientist was sitting next to me, the couple of men had disappeared, and he smiled at me and winked, like if he knew we were the same person. One girl or two approached us and asked him if he'd ever play guitar just for fun, maybe at the end of the course. Then I realized Hamish had told the students he also play electric guitar and I thought of my Telecaster and wanted so hard to play a song.

I'm listening to this White Stripes album, I read somewhere that it was released 20 years ago and I think of you, the phone calls we had 20 years ago, when I had just bought Get Behind Me Satan and was so obsessed with you and dreaming about you while listening to this album. Did you remember me and saw me as I saw myself in this dream?