Feb 15, 2021 3 min read

Paul McCartney is my best friend. I attend lavish parties at his country home and sometimes play in his band. I have Paul’s number on my cellphone. We laugh, talk about life and sing together.

But it’s only in my dreams.

Humans dream, and if you’ve ever watched a dog moving its legs and stifling woofs while it sleeps, you probably believe that they dream as well. About what, I wonder? Are they chasing something? Are they cavorting with fellow canines? Do they dream that they know Lassie? Do they have her number on their cellphones?

Every so often friends will recount dreams they’ve had. Most times, I’ve had similar ones.

Dreams of Paul McCartney are a big improvement over the dreams of my youth, which often involved my being chased by an invisible Satan or one of his minions. I would run up a staircase and attempt to turn on a light. But the switch never worked. I opened my mouth to scream, but no sound came out.

They say that dreams of being chased stem from anxiety or that you are trying to avoid making decisions in your waking life. I can’t decide if that’s true.

I used to dream frequently that I was back in high school and couldn’t remember the location of my next class. I’d try to find my schedule, but couldn’t. Those dreams ceased about the time I retired. Of course! If you no longer have to be anywhere at a certain time, why worry about being there?

But I still dream that I can’t remember where I parked my car, or that I’m ready to play with a band but forgot to bring my bass. This type of dream, interpreters tell you, means that “you may really have misplaced something that you had not realized yet.” That something would probably be my cellphone. Here’s a tip: If you have a black cellphone in a black protective case, don’t set it down on something black. This solution came to me in a dream.

One of my scariest, most vivid dreams occurred almost 50 years ago, not long after my father died. At the time I had a clock radio with a sleep timer. I fell asleep to music and began to dream that I saw my dad’s face. It was at first in the distance, but it grew larger and larger, and I felt as if he were pulling me toward him. Half awake, I could hear the radio. And I thought, “If that radio shuts off, I will be dead.” I woke up, and the radio was still playing. Whew! But I had turned 90 degrees in bed, as if I had been being pulled. Cue “The Twilight Zone” theme.

“To see or talk to the dead … may be a way for you to resolve your feelings with those who have passed on,” one dream analysis website offers. That, too makes sense: I never got along with my dad. In fact, I never really liked him. I realized pretty quickly after Dad’s death that he was a product of his upbringing, as are we all. So maybe that dream did, in fact, help me resolve feelings.

Or maybe he was trying to drag me to hell.

I’m still wondering about my “being chased by Satan” dreams. I haven’t been anxious for many a year; I guess that’s why these dreams stopped.

Or maybe … just maybe … Satan caught me.