Dream, Crumb

Last night’s dream...

... involved me visiting the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary with a friend of mine. The identity of the friend kept changing. Sometimes I think it was Travis, and other times I think it was David or Aaron and we were looking for Travis, and other times it might have been Kim.

Anyway, the most vivid part of the dream involved me entering this huge, huge auditorium where a professor was lecturing. This hall was amazing. I entered on the balcony level, and the professor was giving a Powerpoint presentation (accompanied by Christian Rock). There were thousands of desks for students, and everything was paneled in stained wood. And the really amazing thing: There was no lower level over which the balcony level “hovered.” Instead, there was a wood-paneled “cliff” over the balcony’s edge, dropping down 200 feet to the floor of the auditorium. Affixed to this cliff were rows and rows of swiveling desks. The chairs were bolted to the vertical wall, but were angled so that the students who sat in them were facing outward, as one would be in a normal chair.

We were trying to get to the bottom of the auditorium and we had to climb down the wall, from one desk to another. After finally climbing all the way to the floor, I looked up and was impressed by how far we had descended.

One of Travis’s friends came over to me, happy to see me. I suspected that he was thinking that I had converted, or that at least there was hope for me. We all went together looking for Travis, and climbed up these stairs to a hall that was under construction. There was an unfinished door, unattached to the wall, which I had to slide out of the way. That’s all I can remember.

Movie

A couple of nights ago I finished watching the documentary “Crumb.” I had seen a little bit of it a few years ago. What a great movie. It’s a series of interviews with artist/illustrator Robert Crumb, his two brothers, and others (critics, ex-girlfriends, etc.). Totally weird, quite humorous, dark and sad, and thoroughly engrossing. This is one of those documentaries that go into the category of “wow, this is how great a documentary can be.”

Next, I want to re-watch “American Splendor,” which is an almost-documentary about the writer of American Splendor comics ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Splendor ), and in which the character of Robert Crumb appears.