I had an opportunity to visit Seaworld with my girlfriend yesterday and, while there, rode the obligatory roller-coaster a number of times. When it comes to thrill rides, I guess I fall somewhere in between “novice” and “greenhorn,” but it’s not like my roller-coaster virginity was usurped or anything. I’d done it before. The “Great White,” which pretty much hangs you by your armpits and flings you around was a somewhat frightening, but generally uneventful ride. The “Steel Eel,” though, which is the more standard, sit-in-a-car-and-hope-nobody-vomits-on-you-from-behind ride, provided a more visceral scare: apparently designed with the big-boned passenger in mind, the molded plastic restraint allowed for a little more play than was comfortable for me, a whisper-thin lad of 155 pounds. Either I had reached transcendental enlightenment, or the extreme G-forces were causing me to levitate three inches off of my seat. Regardless, I got a few bruises, but was essentially all right.
Anyway, last evening, while trying to sleep, I experienced something quite new to me. I felt as if I were in that limbo between wakefulness and sleep, aligned more towards the side of wakefulness, though, because I was completely consciousness and could hear going-on within my house (and continued to be able to do so throughout the whole thing.) I could FEEL myself on the coaster, could feel the forces acting on my body, and could feel my muscles reacting as such (in other words, it wasn’t strictly a mental thing.) Underneath their lids, my eyes were moving up and down and from side to side, completely against my will, pressing so hard it was almost uncomfortable. I said to myself, “Hey, this is pretty nifty. Let’s so where this goes. I won’t open my eyes.” It just continued for a while, with me simultaneously trying to figure out the cause of the phenomena. I couldn’t at the time, but didn’t care. I just found it fascinating. I knew that if I moved any part of my body or, especially, opened my eyes, it would end, so I kept still. In time, though, I swallowed, and was sort of alarmed at how incredibly dry my throat was. At that point, I figured, “Hey, I’d better cut this out.” I opened my eyes, and it was over.
Was this a lucid dream, or something hypnogogic?