Dream Blog for BANKING ON DREAMS, one of Dr. Karen Petit's novels. - www.bankingondreams.com

An Amusing Dream

11/21/2017

I had an interesting dream last night about living in a trailer in an amusement park. There were so many rides that I did not even have the time to visit all of them. One was right next to a beach. Another one involved multiple different kinds of slides.
The setting in my dream was as interesting and fun as the "Amusement Plus" chapter in Unhidden Pilgrims. In this chapter, Heidi and Kevin went to a store, so they could question the employees about possible criminal activity. They then had a lot of fun going down a slide as a part of their work day.

Driving a Car in an Office

3/25/2016

Last night, I had a wonderfully positive dream: I drove my car around the inside of an office building. I went up and down stairs, around desks, avoided electrical cords, and actually had a lot of fun. All of my colleagues at work were really nice. I also had the freedom to drive without stop signs, speed limits, and dead ends. While there were streetlights, they were all green. Even with all of this freedom, though, I behaved myself. I slowed down when necessary and speeded up when some people wanted me to drive more quickly to help them with a project.

Dreaming about Creating "Many Good Thanks" Blog Entries

11/13/2015

A few nights ago, right before falling asleep, I kept on thinking about adding an item to my "Many Good Thanks" blog page on my mayflowerdreams.com Website. While awake, I didn't think of any ideas for the blog, but after I fell asleep, I had a nice dream about creating blog entries. A man in a tie and a formal white shirt appeared in my dream. He offered to help. I asked him about a definition of "installation." He didn't seem to know. I then asked about creating some items to install on a blog page. He kept on asking me "What? What?" Finally, I realized that I was already creating and writing down some nice ideas for a blog. The gentleman then was helpful when he suggested that I not use actual paper for the completed entries; he told me to rather use a computer screen for the backdrop of the installation of the blog entries. Yes, I'm obviously following his suggestion for this blog entry, as well as for entries on the Many Good Thanks blog page.

Growing Plants and Books

5/15/2015

One of Petit's young tomato plants

Plants are often a part of Karen Petit's dreams, as two of the dream blog entries (3/13/15 and 3/20/15) on this Webpage show.

As a child, Petit often helped out in her family's garden, but she did not know too much about the process of growing plants. Decades later, after having her own children, she learned a lot about how to garden from her father, Raymond Johnson. In the 1990's, he started talking about wanting to grow a garden again, so Petit asked him for his help in starting a garden in her own back yard. He came over on most Sundays for church and dinner, as well as to help out with the garden. Together, they enjoyed the family time together, in addition to the creation of a garden every year. Even though Petit's father has passed on, she still loves gardening. She finds it peaceful because she often thinks about her family while creating new plant life. She also loves the exercise and the tasty vegetables.

Petit loves not only to see new plants grow, but also to watch the growth of an idea through the process of writing. Her two novels, Banking on Dreams and Mayflower Dreams, both show connections between a protagonist’s dreams and her reality.

Because Petit loves both writing and gardening, she's really excited about being a featured ARIA (Association of Rhode Island) author at the North Scituate Farmers' Market, 46 Institute Lane, North Scituate, RI 02857, on Saturday, June 6th, from 9 a.m. - 12 noon. Signed copies of both novels will be available in electronic and print versions at Petit's Scituate Farmers' Market event. More information is available on her author event page.

Creating Psychological and Symbolic Elements

4/9/2015

The use of dream content in a novel can show readers why a character acts in a certain way, even if the character does not seem to understand his/her own actions. For example, on page 300 of Mayflower Dreams, the protagonist is dreaming as she remembers something that happened in her past. She watches a memory version of herself. Her past, present, and future are connected together as she relives an event from her past that result in anxiety about her present and future life:

                       Rose knew what was going to happen next. She said, “Oh,
             no” as she saw the memory version of herself shifting her weight
             again; her left knee buckled. To avoid falling down the stairs, she
             had grabbed onto the stairway railing with both of her hands. The
              laundry basket fell down the stairs. The memory version of Rose
             did not fall, but her knee really hurt as she slowly walked down
              the rest of the stairs, picked up the basket, moved the clothes into
             the washer, and started the machine. When she turned around
             to begin the painful journey back up the stairs, she paused for
             a moment and looked directly at the spot where the real Rose
             from the future was standing. The real Rose was invisible to the
             memory Rose, but the real Rose knew that the memory version
             of herself was thinking about the future and about possibly never
             getting better. In the past, she had asked herself, “What will
             happen if I have to spend the rest of my life with this pain?” She
             had not yet found an answer to her question. (Petit 300)

                                             Work Cited
Petit, Karen. Mayflower Dreams. Mustang, Oklahoma: Tate Publishing and Enterprises, LLC, 2014. Print.

Creating the Content of a Dream

4/2/2015

Using lucid dreaming techniques can help people to sometimes control the focus and content of their dreams. Dr. Petit, like many other people, thinks about her family, friends, and work before falling asleep. The result is she often dreams about her family, friends, and work. Petit has used parts of her own dreams to help create content in both of her novels: Banking on Dreams and Mayflower Dreams.
In Banking on Dreams, two of the characters--Lisa and Mike--try to dream the same dream by focusing their thoughts on similar content. This excerpt from page 193 of Petit's novel shows some of the dialogue between the two characters as they make plans for their future dreams:

                 “Well, supposedly, concentrating on something right before going to sleep might result in
          having a lucid dream—or a regular dream—about the area of concentration. In other words,
          if I think about the bank right before going to sleep, I might dream about the bank.”

            “That explains why I dream about work so much, including guns, shoot-outs, prison, and
          car chases. I even have dreams about all of the paperwork, like the reports.” After Mike thought
          for a moment, he added, “Would you like to try something?”

               “Okay. What?”

             Mike smiled, and his eyes showed his excitement. “Let’s both try to dream about
          the same thing tonight and see what happens.” (Petit 193)

                                                                     Work Cited
Petit, Karen. Banking on Dreams. Mustang, Oklahoma: Tate Publishing and Enterprises, LLC, 2012. Print.

Creating and Connecting Actions to a Setting

3/26/2015

Dr. Karen Petit has often had dreams about Rhode Island's Mount Hope Bridge. In one of these dreams, she was standing on top of a broken piece of concrete as it fell down into the water. In a different dream, she had to swim for several hours before finally arriving safely on a beach.

In Banking on Dreams, the Mount Hope Bridge appears more than once as a dream setting. In chapter three, the protagonist had an interesting lucid dream about this bridge. Page 48 of Banking on Dreams illustrates the protagonist as she begins to interact with her setting and tries to control a part of this dream:

                Lisa knew that she was having a lucid dream, and she had been able to exert
          a little bit of control in her last dream. Maybe during this dream, she could control the bridge.
                Lisa took a step; the bridge began to make noises. A huge crack formed in front of her.
          As she watched, the crack became wider and wider. She could now see the blue of the water
          through the broken part of the bridge. A sailboat was moving in the water, but the boat’s
          motions were faster than those of the earlier sailboats. . . . (Petit 48)

Work Cited
Petit, Karen. Banking on Dreams. Mustang, Oklahoma: Tate Publishing and Enterprises, LLC, 2012. Print.

Visualizing a Setting for a Novel

3/25/2015

What a person is thinking about while awake can affect what the person dreams about that night. For example, while writing Mayflower Dreams, Dr. Petit did a lot of research about the Pilgrims. This research helped her to create historically accurate content for her novel, as well as to have several helpful dreams. One night, after doing a lot of research that included looking at online images of historic paintings, Petit then went to sleep. She dreamed about living in the seventeenth century, walking on cobblestone streets, and going inside of multiple stone buildings. Exploring this setting in her dream world helped her to envision the appropriate setting for some parts of her historical novel. The following excerpt from page 77 of Mayflower Dreams shows Rose (the protagonist of this novel) in the middle of her dream story about the Pilgrims:

                       Rose followed Mary into a stone building. The windows were all open, and
            there were no screens. A large number of flies and mosquitos were present. Some
           were flying around, and some were interested in the food sitting on the wooden table.
     There was meat that looked like chicken or turkey. Wooden bowls in the middle of the
           table contained pieces of flattened bread, a salad, and a cheesecake. The table was
          set with cloth napkins, spoons, and knives; there were no forks.
             The floor under the table had a beautiful handmade rug with flowers, leaves,
           and other designs. In the middle of the rug’s designs appeared some words from
           the Lord’s Prayer: “Give us this day our daily bread” (Matt. 6:11 GNV). (Petit 77)

Work Cited
Petit, Karen. Mayflower Dreams. Mustang, Oklahoma: Tate Publishing and Enterprises, LLC, 2014. Print.

Creating a Labyrinth of Dream and Reality Components

3/20/2015

The setting for “A Garage Sale” chapter in Banking on Dreams was taken directly from one of Karen Petit’s dreams. Her own gardening tools, including the clippers in the picture on the right, were in her dream. The garage was a giant, beautiful garage with several cars and over ten tables in it.
In Banking on Dreams, the garage sale happened during the day time while Lisa, the protagonist, was awake. During the next chapter of this novel, during the night, Lisa had a dream about an auction. This dream of hers incorporated some of the content from her real visit to the garage sale into the events of the chapter titled “An Auction.” The labyrinth of hedges that is referenced in the garage and the auction chapters of this novel also appeared in one of Petit’s dreams, but the labyrinth was in a different dream from her garage-sale dream.

The following excerpt is from page 169 in a daytime reality chapter of Banking on Dreams (“A Garage Sale”):
   Lisa didn’t really find anything that she wanted, so she went back to join her father,
                 who was holding onto a pair of hedge clippers.
           Lisa asked her father, “Are you buying those?”
             He responded by raising the clippers up high enough so that Lisa could see them. “Look
                         at these blades. I know I won’t need them in November, but in the spring they’ll come in handy.”
               Her father’s neighbor commented, “Yeah, the branches on your hedges, Nelson, turn around
                 on themselves. They’re like plant labyrinths.”
            Lisa’s father smiled, raised the clippers, and said, “You’re right, Bob. They’re like labyrinths,
                     but these clippers will trim them nicely.”
                Bob asked Lisa’s father, “Are you going to the auction tomorrow night?”
                “What auction is this?” Lisa asked. (Petit 169)

When Lisa falls asleep that night, the labyrinth of hedges also appears in one of her dreams. This dream is depicted in the next chapter of Banking on Dreams: “An Auction.” In addition to an auction, this chapter has a scene that takes place in a labyrinth of hedges. Here is a short section from this scene:
   “Where do you think you’re going?” the suspect asked.
       Mike glared and then responded, “Out of this labyrinth.”
       The suspect took a step toward Mike before saying, “There’s no way out.”
       “How do you know that?” Mike asked.
     “I’ve been trying to escape for ages. The hedges just keep on growing.” (Petit 186)

Work Cited
Petit, Karen. Banking on Dreams. Mustang, Oklahoma: Tate Publishing and Enterprises, LLC, 2012. Print.

Creativity with Dreams

3/13/2015

The content in Dr. Karen Petit's novels has been created from her own reality, dreams, and research. Banking on Dreams illustrates a variety of lucid dreaming techniques and shows how dreams and reality are connected to each other. Mayflower Dreams connects a protagonist's dream story about the Pilgrims to her modern reality. Both novels have interesting themes, plots, characters, settings, symbols, and psychological elements.

Whenever Petit has an interesting dream, whether it's a regular dream or a lucid dream, she immediately writes it down. This dream-writing process helps her to remember more of a dream's segments. Even if this author doesn't use the dream in her current novel, she may use it in a future one. Writing down examples of dreams also allows this author to see how the dream elements work together. She can then better create realistic dreams within her novels, as well as connections between a protagonist's reality and dreams.

One of Petit's most wonderful dreams has not yet been placed into one of her novels, but she is planning on using it in the future. This dream happened when Petit fell asleep while thinking about her workplace. She was walking to work as an adjunct faculty member at a community college. She paused to say "Hi" to several of her students. It was a beautiful Spring day. As this faculty member and her students began to talk about writing, flowers suddenly began to grow from some seeds within her briefcase. Because of the communication and learning happening while the flowers were growing, the growth of the flowers showed the symbolic beauty of the educational process.