The Night Ocean

H.P. Lovecraft "The Night Ocean" 

Now that I am trying to tell what I saw I am conscious of a thousand maddening limitations. Things seen by the inward sight, like those flashing visions which come as we drift into the blankness of sleep, are more vivid and meaningful to us in that form than when we have sought to weld them with reality. Set a pen to a dream, and the colour drains from it. The ink with which we write seems diluted with something holding too much of reality, and we find that after all we cannot delineate the incredible memory. It is as if our inward selves, released from the bonds of daytime and objectivity, revelled in prisoned emotions which are hastily stifled when we translate them. In dreams and visions lie the greatest creations of man, for on them rests no yoke of line or hue. Forgotten scenes, and lands more obscure than the golden world of childhood, spring into the sleeping mind to reign until awakening puts them to rout. Amid these may be attained something of the glory and contentment for which we yearn; some image of sharp beauties suspected but not before revealed, which are to us as the Grail to holy spirits of the medieval world. To shape these things on the wheel of art, to seek to bring some faded trophy from that intangible realm of shadow and gossamer, requires equal skill and memory. For although dreams are in all of us, few hands may grasp their moth-wings without tearing them.    

Did you know:

Yawning is an unacceptable behavior for Muslims, especially in public places. If yawning occurs, the yawner is instructed to cover his mouth with his hand. The Prophet said, "Yawning is from Satan. If you are about to yawn, you should try to stop it as much as possible. If you yawn, Satan will laugh"  Does Reason Sleep Tonight? Frequently I have pondered the phenomena of hypnagogia.  What is that?  This is what Wikipedia says.   Hypnagogia (from Greek hypn "sleep" + agōgos "leading, inducing") is the transitional state between wakefulness and sleep (i.e., the onset of sleep), originally coined in adjectival form as "hypnagogic" by Alfred Maury.[1][2] The equivalent transition to wakefulness is termed the hypnopompic state. Mental phenomena that occur during this "threshold consciousness" phase include lucid dreaming, hallucinations, out of body experiences and sleep paralysis. Sometimes the word hypnagogia is used in a restricted sense to refer to the onset of sleep, and contrasted with hypnopompia, Frederic Myers's term for waking up.[4] However, hypnagogia is also regularly employed in a more general sense that covers both falling asleep and waking up, and Havelock Ellis questioned the need for separate terms.[5] Like I question the need for separate terms for Liberal or Conservative, or Democrat or Republican.  Indeed, it is not always possible in practice to assign a particular episode of any given phenomenon to one or the other, given that the same kinds of experience occur in both, and that people may drift in and out of sleep.  In the words of Bart Simpson, I always dreamed of becoming a drifter. Other terms for hypnagogia, in one or both senses, that have been proposed include  "visions of half-sleep", "the borderland of sleep",  the "borderland state", "half-dream state",  and dreamlets. Romanticism brought a renewed interest in the subjective experience of the edges of sleep.[13] And what is more romantic than the ''edges of sleep"?    I am reminded of the lyrics to the song Detour Ahead: The farther you travel The harder to unravel the web he spins around you Turn back while there's time Can't you see the danger sign? Soft shoulders surround you [edit]Tetris effect People who have spent a long time at some repetitive activity before sleep, in particular one that is new to them, may find that it dominates their imagery as they grow drowsy, a tendency dubbed the Tetris effect. This effect has even been observed in amnesiacs who otherwise have no memory of the original activity.[28] When the activity involves moving objects, as in the video game Tetris, the corresponding hypnagogic images tend to be perceived as moving. The Tetris effect is not confined to visual imagery, but can manifest in other modalities also.  [edit]Sounds Hypnagogic imagery is often auditory or has an auditory component. Like the visuals, hypnagogic sounds vary in intensity from faint impressions to loud noises, such as crashes and bangs (exploding head syndrome). People may imagine their own name called or a doorbell ringing. Snatches of imagined speech are common. While typically nonsensical and fragmented, these speech events can occasionally strike the individual as apt comments on—or summations of—their thoughts at the time. They often contain word play, neologisms and made-up names. Hypnagogic speech may manifest as the subject's own "inner voice", or as the voices of others: familiar people or strangers. More rarely, poetry or music is heard.[29]   Now that is sad that poetry and music are not often heard.   Do you think a support group would be helpful? [edit]Sleep paralysis Humming, roaring, hissing, rushing, zapping, and buzzing noises are frequent in conjunction with sleep paralysis (SP). This happens when the REM atonia sets in sooner than usual, before the person is fully asleep, or persists longer than usual, after the person has (in other respects) fully awoken.[18] Sleep paralysis is reportedly very frequent among narcoleptics. It occurs frequently in about 6% of the rest of the population, and occurs occasionally in 60%.[30] In surveys from Canada, China, England, Japan and Nigeria, 20 to 60% of individuals reported having experienced SP at least once in their lifetime.[31][32] The paralysis itself is frequently accompanied by additional phenomena. Typical examples include a feeling of being crushed or suffocated, electric "tingles" or "vibrations", imagined speech and other noises, the imagined presence of a visible or invisible entity, and sometimes intense emotion: fear or euphoria and orgasmic feelings.[31][33] SP has been proposed as an explanation for at least some alien abduction experiences and shadow people hauntings.  Shadow people hauntings?  Orgasmic feelings? [edit]Other sensations Gustatory, olfactory and thermal sensations in hypnagogia have all been reported, as well as tactile sensations (including those kinds classed as paresthesia or formication). Sometimes there is synesthesia; many people report seeing a flash of light or some other visual image in response to a real sound. Proprioceptive effects may be noticed, with numbness and changes in perceived body size and proportions,[35] feelings of floating or bobbing, and out-of-body experiences.[36] Perhaps the most common experience of this kind is the falling sensation, and associated hypnic jerk, encountered by many people, at least occasionally, while drifting off to sleep.[37]How is that for a slag?  You hypnic jerk!!! [edit]Subjective interpretation Hypnagogic phenomena may be interpreted as visions, prophecies, premonitions, apparitions and inspiration (artistic or divine), depending on the experiencers' beliefs and those of their culture. Could this explain the Bible?  [edit]Cognitive and affective phenomena [edit]Receptivity and suggestibility Thought processes on the edge of sleep tend to differ radically from those of ordinary wakefulness. Hypnagogia may involve a "loosening of ego boundaries ... openness, sensitivity, internalization-subjectification of the physical and mental environment (empathy) and diffuse-absorbed attention."[38] Sorry dear, its my loosening of ego boundaries.  Let me just loosen my ego boundary and slip into something more comfortable.   Hypnagogic cognition, in comparison with that of normal, alert wakefulness, is characterized by heightened suggestibility,[39] illogic and a fluid association of ideas. Such as writing a blog?  Subjects are more receptive in the hypnagogic state to suggestion from an experimenter than at other times, and readily incorporate external stimuli into hypnagogic trains of thought and subsequent dreams. This receptivity has a physiological parallel; EEG readings show elevated responsiveness to sound around the onset of sleep.[40] [edit]Autosymbolism Herbert Silberer described a process he called autosymbolism, whereby hypnagogic hallucinations seem to represent, without repression or censorship, whatever one is thinking at the time, turning abstract ideas into a concrete image, which may be perceived as an apt and succinct representation thereof.[41] [edit]Insight The hypnagogic state can provide insight into a problem, the best known example being August Kekulé’s realization that the structure of benzene was a closed ring after dozing in front of a fire and seeing molecules forming into snakes, one of which grabbed its tail in its mouth.[42] Many other artists, writers, scientists and inventors—including Beethoven, Richard Wagner, Walter Scott, Salvador Dalí, Thomas Edison and Isaac Newton—have credited hypnagogia and related states with enhancing their creativity.[43]  A 2001 study by Harvard psychologist Deirdre Barrett found that, while problems can also be solved in full-blown dreams from later stages of sleep, hypnagogia was especially likely to solve problems which benefit from hallucinatory images being critically examined while still before the eyes.[44]   Now that is what I call 'problem solving.' [edit]Amnesia A feature that hypnagogia shares with other stages of sleep is amnesia. But this is a selective forgetfulness, affecting the hippocampalmemory system, which is responsible for episodic or autobiographical memory, rather than the neocortical memory system, responsible for semantic memory.[9]   It has been suggested that hypnagogia and REM sleep help in the consolidation of semantic memory,[45] but the evidence for this has been disputed.[46] For example, suppression of REM sleep due to antidepressants and lesions to the brainstem has not been found to produce detrimental effects on cognition.[47]  Could this be the real reason behind the REM breakup?   Lesions to the brainstem?  Enquiring minds need to know! [edit]Daydreaming and waking reveries Microsleep (short episodes of immediate sleep onset) may intrude into wakefulness at any time in the wakefulness-sleep cycle, due to sleep deprivation and other conditions,[57] resulting in impaired cognition, amnesia.[17] Why waste hours 'sleeping' when you could be microsleeping?  How much more work could we get done, if we were only allowed to microsleep?   I often wonder that after working a typical 14 hour day. Gurstelle and Oliveira distinguish a state which they call daytime parahypnagogia (DPH), the spontaneous intrusion of a flash image or dreamlike thought or insight into one's waking consciousness. DPH is typically encountered when one is "tired, bored, suffering from attention fatigue, and/or engaged in a passive activity." Such as driving, or operating heavy machinery??? The exact nature of the episode may be forgotten even though the individual remembers having had such an experience.8]  I remember getting married, and having children, and then....well it all is a big blur.

Prod Amin: the final cut, as told to dense milt

Doreen Grey circa 2010

Originally written in 1980-81 and published by now defunct WESTCOAST MUSIC MAGAZINE.

Doreen Grey- Lenore Herb left our earthly plane in 2010.  She was a true visionary outsider, and is missed more than words can express.

(Fuzzy insert of old TV serial)

“Stand back Billy, this is far too dangerous for you!"

"Golly gee, Mr. Milt. No one’s too young for Doreen."

You are about to enter the eyes of Doreen Grey. 

Warm your heart with the tale of Vancouver's video visionary who, in three short years, has risen from the dead generations of beatniks and hippies, from humble beginnings as a punk inspired video artist, to her position of primetime doctor of documentation, musical archivist, political activist and musician.

Doreen Grey is quickly gaining a reputation (even as I now write this) for the voice that doesn’t stop when the TV's turned off. She is a firm believer in change), and the powers of youth and women, she is involved with Metromedia, a non-profit society offering community access to electronic media; has been instrumental in the formation of three music/arts cooperatives- Push Art, MODAMU and Unit 306, which promote democracy in the arts and self-promotion.

But Doreen Grey is probably best known for the work on her own Prod Productions. Possessing one of the best archives of new music on the West Coast, Ms. Grey has systematically set out to document the new music developments since their inception three years ago. Many of these bands have since changed so dramatically, or broken up, that these visual records of a musical and social rebellion are invaluable. Her special projects with Point Zero Eight, Braineaters, AKA, Sea Monkey and the Melodic Energy Commission do more than document progress; they stand as video art pieces in their own right.

Her tape High Monkey Noon ("a plea-for understanding in a world too used to misinterpretation") was the first locally made compilation to grace the screen at the MODAMU (Moderndancemusic) historical first video/rock gig. And this is the major point that separates Doreen Grey from other video artists: her accessibility and integrity. Instead of treating the medium as some highbrow experience shown only in small cloistered rooms of art school or the Video Inn, Doreen has taken her work to the masses, showing them at hall gigs, parties and Rohans, making the evening sparkle in the boring time lags between bands. 

Doreen Grey was kind enough to peel off a few of the screens sheltering her third eye (a few adults are blessed with a third media eye) delivering a musical hysterectomy of Vancouver in the process.

A play with words: One Ax. Credits Roll...Lights. Camera on Dense Milt:

Dense: Doreen, let's start with your association with Sea Monkey, that fab-duo, and discreetly work our way to the bottom of your musical history.

(Switch)

Doreen: Giving berth to roaming Sea Monkeys (please note: Methods and Procedures for Proper Care and Feeding of Sea Monkeys) was a natural process; another evolutionary step along the starting path from baby bed in the closet, to the time I left home to live with artists and poets, which was after my $20 trip to San Francisco before the summer of love. 

I was going to live there, but fate lead me to stay and take LSD. The house we lived in got really notorious, after a drug bust we decided to turn it into an art gallery and hung up a huge sign off the front porch telling everyone to GO AWAY - ARTISTS AT WORK.  
Al Clapp, who was working for the CBC, came and did a news hour special, showing the lab and our brightly coloured psychedelic rooms. We were plagued by weekend hippies (that's when I first met some of U-J3RK5 (an older-type college punk band) but soon almost everyone succumbed to being a full time freak. We were also plagued by the usual straight and Right Wing media-types. The final outcome of the 60's was hippy businessmen and the best result was evidenced by the generation that was just growing up then, particularly the free schools. 

This was a new attitude toward youth and freedom. Parents started to realize their children didn't need to conform to society to succeed. The next big influence in my life was after the death of my poet-husband, when my daughter was eight months old. Although it was tragic, it resulted in a lot of good, because it made me independent and learn to survive on my own without being somebody's woman or wife; it taught me how to live by, and for myself.

It also showed me how fickle and uncaring the community was. But that was when music came into my life again. The huge gap left by people was taken up by the likes of Lightning Sam drifting up from the boys' stereo in the apartment below. King Luxsac, at a time when nobody had horn players, would play at be-ins to derision and laughter, because they had trombones, alto sax, tenor sax, trumpet, as well as the standard R&B instrumentation.

ZOOM to Mr. Milt's shoes. (Randy) Pandora is on Camera.

Dense: Do you think there was or is a lot of creativity in Vancouver?

(Pull back. Pull anything.)

Doreen: There's something about Vancouver - it's a very poetic town.

There is a really strong energy that is like an oozing primal swamp, which lends itself to a lot of creativity. It comes out every ten years or so. And having been born here, I feel sort of blessed with a native vision. San Francisco may be the psychic capitol of the world, but Vancouver has something else that could be very powerful if the right people were to unleash it.  I'm saying this because it’s the only level left to people with humanity left in them to come and survive the holocaust. Or we could continue in a type of grim patriarchal dictatorship that leaves everyone pale and ghoul-like with the only color added being red, the blood of the children sacrificed on the cross of consumerism.

(Insert with care)

Dense: I would say this unleashing of energy happened around the start of the initial punk happenings – that spirit of youth, rebellion, and intelligence. What influence did this have on your life?

(Switch- Intense close-up of Doreen).

Doreen: It was music that woke you up, and made your blood circulate; made your nerve endings come alive and your brain start to think. It was like coming alive after being dead for so many years. It was as though I was driven to capture this; I didn't think about why, I just did it. I knew somebody had to do it. 

The people in the new music scene are very attractive; I'm not going to say sexually  but an energy. (CLOSEUP on Doreen Grey's lascivious grin.) You can look at someone and say they are alive, so alive, you want to be alive too. And you can look at some people and say they are dead. 

I could say punk was an excuse to do video, but it was almost as if the two came together. It was technology that also attracted me. I had been through the horror stage when we rejected anything electronic and sat in fear of machines. But this music was so packed with life and energy, that it could transform you. This is sort of a natural process of growing older; you die over and over again in your lifetime. You become a different person. You have to. You become transfigured.

(Fade. Enter religious music).

Dense: It was at this point our Doreen became known as Doreen Grey. She gathered together a group of people to videotape the early punk gigs. This group called Chaos, later kicked Doreen out because of her supposed lack of ability and knowledge. Still obsessed with her vision of capturing this music, Doreen contacted people from her past and began the tapes of major poets, who were visiting for a special series of readings to promote West Coast presses. She received a grant from the Canada Council to finish her post-production.

Included in these tapes were Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginsberg, Michael McLure, Margaret Atwood, bill bisset, bp nichol, Victor Coleman and Steve McCaffery. Working through Metromedia, she learned the technology of video. 

She also learned the politics of control; how the means of production were firmly entrenched in the hands of a small patriarchal dictatorship. Doreen Grey's progress to date is really a testament to the tenacity of her survival in the face of odds faced by most women trying to invade all-male territory. 

I asked Doreen about the people who dismiss her work as punk video.

(Camera 1 on her third eye).

Doreen: Some people don't appreciate people who have eyes to see. There was a multitude of creativity happening, that not only had eyes, but got angry and annoyed and thought things out for themselves.  Because when you do that, you take responsibility for your own existence.  And when you do that, you can’t blame society; you have to start to think.  

Thinking is a frightening thing for some people.  They’re afraid they going to find something out about themselves they don’t like.  Sanity in this society is thought to be someone who is happy, and if you’re not happy and satisfied, there is something wrong with you.  I’d always wonder why people didn’t do something, without realizing the reason it wasn’t being done was that I myself didn’t go and do it when I saw the necessity.  

And I think that is the crux of everything; if people observe something or think something should be done, and I’m not talking about tearing things apart, going out and beating someone up, telling someone to fuck off, I’m talking about creating things.  

As far as I am concerned, I think everyone is a potential artist.  Everyone in society can create.  When I look through a camera, I’m trying to interpret what the person is saying.  I can see it; I can hear it.  

When I’m behind the camera I want to make it an extension of me trying to understand. So other people can understand.  I’m an interpreter. I try to translate real people and happenings onto videotape and make it accessible to people.  

Through the eyes of Doreen Grey: I’d like people to better understand each other. 

(Fade) Lone spot returns to Dense Milt. 

Dense: The future plans of Doreen Grey, truly a myth in the making, include the set up of a community broadcast station, more community production and starting her own musical group.  She wears black, red and certain striped materials, frequently wonders why it’s the poor kids that are the ones who always get sexually abused.  (Abrupt cut)  

Pause for refreshments.  

Hands shook.

When I found this the other day (again), I was amazed how well it stood the test of time.  Consider that these words are about 30 years old.  Doreen Grey lives on in her work, and in her own words. 

A celebration of her life and life's work happens this Sunday, November 6, 2011 at 560 Seymour Street, in Vancouver, BC Canada.