Neglect Devours

I’ve heard it argued that our dreams are trying to tell us something important about ourselves. I’ve also heard it argued that dreams are nothing but a random assemblage of memories and thoughts, broken shards of glass that are glued back together into a meaningless pattern with no design or intention.

I suspect that the truth, like many truths, is a little of both.

I had a dream last night in which I owned a large pet snake that I had long-neglected to feed. I had put off its feeding for other activities, though a part of me knew the snake was badly starved. Finally I decided to feed the snake.

I opened the snake’s cage and it lunged at my right hand. It gaped its jaws wide and swallowed the hand, and attempted to continue devouring the arm affixed to that hand. I can’t believe it thinks it can eat me, I thought.

I screamed for help, but everyone was distracted by their phones. My left hand, my good hand, went numb.

I believe the message is clear: we (I) can be devoured by the things we neglect. The snake is a metaphor for anything we value but fail to nourish. The neglected thing starves, and any starving organic thing is capable of becoming monstrous. Put off the nourishment for too long and any attempt to feed the snake is futile.

The snake can be substituted for practically anything, but I think it holds truest when substituted for a relationship, a possession, or your own health.

And what greater distraction to duty exists today than the smartphone? And still, the dream’s phone distraction can be a metaphor for anything capable of instant gratification but little lasting pleasure. By focusing on these things, we allow the pet we value to starve and eventually become something hideous.

Nourishing anything of value requires work.

Plants whither when they aren’t watered.

Kids join gangs when they have no other sense of belonging.

Neglect your own body and it becomes fertile soil for budding diseases.

Giving the things we value the proper attention means often saying “no” to the world’s army of distractions.

I must not neglect the metaphorical starving snake in the other room.