babbling blue

I woke up this morning, and groggily looked at the alarm clock. My vision was still blurry, but it looked like it said 10:30-something. Holy shit! I had way overslept. I was supposed to be up 4 hours ago! I frantically get up and start looking for my phone, so I can call my boss and let him know that I’d be in soon. I’m freaking out. . . oh my god, 10:30! But I can’t find my phone, and I can’t really focus on the alarm clock for some reason. I’m trying to verify the time and call my boss. All I can find is this one phone that I used temporarily but I can’t get it to show the time. Where the hell is my phone? I know it was on my night stand. I was sure of it, but I can’t find it. I look in pockets and my backpack. Something is not right here. Things are here that shouldn’t be. This can’t be happening! Then I realize what is happening, and I calmly lay back down in bed, concentrate . . .

And then I wake up. For real. It’s 5:19am and my room is dark. I was merely dreaming that I woke up late. Some how in the dream I knew I was dreaming and was able to force myself to wake up without any external stimulus. And this sort of thing has happened before. It’s not common for me, but it’s not exactly rare. Is this normal? Do other people realize they’re dreaming and force themselves into waking up? It comes in rather handy, especially when having a bad dream.

In an interesting twist, I went back to sleep after that (and a trip to the W.C.) and then I did oversleep for real, though only by about 20 minutes. I screwed up setting the alarm on my phone. I wonder if I subconsciously realized the mistake and the dream was a warning that went unheeded…