The Nature of Insanity, a Nagging Dream, and a "Tri-dream"

So, today is Friday, almost Saturday, as my dad, his friend Jennifer, her two boys - Evan and Smith -, and I just came back from a Martina McBride concert. I didn't know who this singer was until tonight, but Jennifer received free tickets from someone - and who can pass up a free concert? We ended up leaving after Ms. McBride's first song, due to Smith's exhaustion. Both of Jennifer's boys are really cool - Evan reminds me a lot of how I was when I was in elementary school. It was great getting to hear him talk about Whitaker's urban legends and the tendency of obnoxious kids to pop their chip bags in the cafeteria each day (I remember this). Overall, it was a really fun night - now tacked to it is an inside-joke from the night's events. My dad, who had been eagerly awaiting McBride's appearance on the stage (partially because he found her attractive), was disappointed when she spent the majority of her first song demonstrating her vocal prowess by repeatedly hitting the same super high note, "WAAAHHH!", with intervals of about ten seconds between each instance of this. This irritated him to the extent that, on the way out of the Greensboro coliseum, he made sport of her stage presence, singing, "I'm Martina McBride - WAHHHHHH! - I wear black leather pants - WAHHHHH! - I like to hit the same note over and over again - WAHHHHHH - I -" until we finally convinced him to stop. But all the way back in the car, whenever it got too quiet, either Jennifer, my dad, Evan, or I would suddenly yell, "WAHHHH!"
The other inside joke was a reference to the urban legend that Evan told us about Whitaker. "A fifth-grader," he said mysteriously, "once told me a story about this creepy house in the woods behind Whitaker. Apparently, there were these four girls, and they were playing with a ball or something when one of them dropped it and it went rolling into the woods behind the school. Well, when the girls went to go get it, they saw that it had landed in someone's backyard. One of the girls walked over to pick it up when - suddenly - an arm came out from the back door of the house and pulled her inside!" The story continued in this fashion, with the girl never reappearing and the sinister ending declaring "and that's why no one ever goes into that forest." My dad, finding this story amusing, began to end all rambling stories that anyone would tell from that point on with the conclusion of - "and then an arm came out and grabbed them, and pulled them inside!" Even trivial stories were treated the same way; for example, I was talking about one of my trumpet lessons, on the way back from the concert. I told about how Ms. Rheder had emerged from the office as I was playing and said that I sounded really good for someone just starting - I suppose I was trying to make a point about Ms. Rheder being a nice lady or something along those lines - when my dad interrupted and said, "and then an arm came out of the office and pulled her inside!" and we were all thoroughly amused.
Moving on, from inside jokes to the nature of insanity, which we were discussing just the other day. I was provoked by dreams (on which I'll soon elaborate) to state my thesis on self-imposed insanity (a theory which I learned from the psychoanalysis book that Patrick gave me for Valentine's Day last year) at lunch the other day, the theory being this: most "neurotic" or crazy people impose their insanity on themselves. The most relatable thing that I can think of to compare this theory to, having never considered myself clinically insane (at least not to the point where reality mingles with imagination), would be the whole concept of "not being able to get a person out of one's head," particularly if this person is beloved or fancied of the "neurotic." Though said neurotic claims that fancied person is "driving them insane," it is partially their fault because they are the ones thinking about the person and at least some twisted part of themselves wants to think about that other person, in spite of the pain that this causes. I'm sure that this is probably true for other, more serious things as well - one might approach a traumatic past experience with these mixed feelings, similar to the feelings that Harry Potter feels in The Prisoner of Azkaban when he hears the last moments of his parents' life through his encounters with dementors (yes, I know I just made a Harry Potter allusion in reference to psychology) and is saddened, but yet intrigued and even overjoyed by the sounds of his parents', whom he has never heard speak outside of this experience.
So, therein lies the basis for self-imposed "insanity," a theory which did not seem to interest my fellow lunchers, as we soon moved on to another topic.
However, I did find it odd that, a few periods later in Biology class, the topic of insanity was mentioned again by Dr. Findeis. We were discussing, of all things, isolation- or sensory deprivation-tanks (I think the latter is what they were once called), which were instruments utilized by the Soviets at one point to "persuade" captured spies to confess useful information. Prisoners were tossed into a pitch-black, sound-proof tank filled with water at body-temperature and given a snorkel or some means to breathe. Then they were left there for however many hours with no socializing or external stimuli - completely left to their own devices. If the prisoners didn't break down and confess, they almost certainly all crumbled to some odd inward insanity, having been subjected entirely to their own thoughts with, essentially, no physical senses. Spooky. In any case, this would of course be an example of externally-imposed insanity, dealing with the social habits of human beings, and I think that this hypothesis is just as valid as the self-imposed insanity hypothesis. My conclusion is that there are just too many ways for someone to become insane nowadays.
In any case, now to the dreams. One night, I can only recall one portion of my dream, in which I was walking into the cafeteria of my school to dispose of trash from my lunch. At the trash can, I was encountered by some school official whom I vaguely knew but had never spoken to. They engaged me in a conversation about a girl in my French class, instructing me to carry her books on certain days of the week. I left to reluctantly assume my responsibilities, though when I woke up, I wondered about the dream's implications, as I had been wanting to speak to this girl for a while now, though it is difficult because of our mutual "quietness." From what I know of her, she seems like a really nice girl; she's new to the school, and seems to be, as my dad would say, "wicked-smart." I plan on engaging her in conversation at some point, though the trick with talking to any new people involves how to do it without being awkward. But, in any case, enough about that.
The next night I had a series of three disturbing dreams, a "Tri-dream" if you will. This was the dream which really made me begin to question my sanity on a superficial level. The first dream lasted for the majority of the night, though it lacks content and plot. In the dream, my father and I were sitting on the couch, watching this interminable movie starring Johnny Depp, Kathy Bates, and two other famous actors whom I cannot remember at the present time (whether or not such a movie exists is beyond my knowledge). This movie, besides being tedious, was also very depressing, in a way that makes one question the purpose of life. The only part that I can remember about it was that Johnny Depp played a father in the film of a seven-ish-year-old boy and was married to Kathy Bates. The film focused on the imperfections of the relationship, their separation at one point, and the little boy's methods of dealing with this sort of life. My dad remarked at some point in the dream that he had once met Johnny Depp (he hasn't in real life) and that Johnny Depp had said that his role in this movie had been his least favorite to play of all the movies he'd been in. That was the entirety of the first dream.
The second dream was a recurring one which I won't describe in excessive detail for that reason. In the dream, I was with Saoirse and Kiki at Reynolds Auditorium, and we were looking for seats from which we would view the Symphony concert, due to start in about 10 minutes. Unlike what happens in most of these dreams, we were able to find awesome seats about ten rows from the stage, and we took great joy in finding these seats. People filed into the auditorium from both sides, chattering, and the stage was empty at that time. Reluctant as we were to desert our seats, we had to find my father, as he was wandering around outside of the building for no particular reason. We pulled him back into the auditorium, fearing that our seats would be stolen by the time we returned. Luckily for us, they had not, though they had somehow moved since we had left. These seats were now located up on the actual stage, behind a boundary designated by vertical poles with rope hanging between them. We went and sat with the other people on stage, of which there were about 20, waiting for the musicians to emerge. They eventually did, to tumultuous applause from the audience, and took their seats in the arc of chairs just within the roped boundary. I stood, holding the rope and scrutinizing their facial expressions. The thing which bothered me in the dream was that they did not seem responsive at all to the audience - it was almost as though an iron curtain hung between the Symphony and the rest of the people. It was a queer feeling - and then the dream changed.
The third dream was most depressing, and will therefore not be told in much detail. My mother went into labor finally, delivering my baby sister. I rushed to the hospital, too late to see my sister born. My grandmother was there as well, and we sat on either side of my mom's hospital bed. While sitting there, my mother, clothed in her hospital gown, proceeded to tell us that she was terminally-ill, that she had been diagnosed two years previously, and that she had neglected to tell us for those two years. I awoke from the dream asking myself why she would go through with having the baby if she knew that she wasn't going to be around to raise it. I awoke from these dreams feeling deeply saddened by their content and my ability to be so deeply saddened by their content simultaneously. It's a trippy effect, if you think about it. I also dreamt last night, though I don't quite remember what it was about.
In other news, my grandparents should be arriving tomorrow for my confirmation banquet, and my sister will be born any day now, hopefully without complications.