Dreamcatchers: Now with the fresh scent of pine!
I saw a minivan in a parking lot today, that had a Native American dreamcatcher (or at least, a cheap knock off) hanging from the rear-view mirror. A dreamcatcher is, as I'm sure you already know, a round or tear-shaped frame with twine laced around its interior. These are made by the Ojibway indians, and their purpose is to catch nightmares, and let the sweet dreams filter through (like and ancient Indian mental Firewall, I suppose). Ojibway parents would hang these up in rooms where the children slept, so that they would have nice dreams all night.

Hanging from the same rear-view mirror, slightly behind the dreamcatcher, was a pine tree-shaped air freshener, the kind you can get free at any filling station with a five dollar purchase of gas.

This brings up a few questions for me. First, why do you need to keep away nightmares when you're behind the wheel? I could understand it if this was hanging in a long-distance shipping truck, but not a minivan. I mean, how much sleeping does this person plan on doing while driving?

Second, does hanging the air freshener with the dreamcatcher make the dreams fresher? Does this make sure that the dreams which do filter through will all be sanitized? Do you end up dreaming of the forest?

Another question, If one decides to hang a playboy air freshener with the dreamcatcher, instead of the pine tree, does that person get an entirely different kind of dream? I mean, if I knew there was a way to have playmates in my dreams, I would have done this years ago.

- posted by BrandG @ 2:13 AM