Dear Libby,

When you go to sleep, the world doesn’t stop existing just because you aren’t aware of it at that moment. I know that when I wake up, things will be pretty much the same as they were when I fell asleep. So what happens to your dreams when you’re awake? There’s no reason to think that they stop existing just because you’re not aware of them at that moment.

Haven’t you ever woken up from a dream, and then when you fall back asleep, you jump right back into that same dream? It happens to me all the time. Sometimes it even seems like some time has passed since the last time I was there. Even if your dreams are fantastical worlds all contained inside your head, they must keep running in the background when you’re going about your day. It’s like a background process on your computer, doing its thing while you look up sautéd mushroom recipes or watch the latest video trends.

Forgive me if this letter is a bit more philosophical than what you’re used to. I don’t have anyone else in my life, so I don’t have any interpersonal drama to ask you about. For all we know, I might be a figment of your imagination. Someone you conjured up in your subconscious mind to give you an outlet for the kinds of thoughts you think others don’t want you to talk about. Who are we, Libby? Do you even know anymore?

–Endless Dreamer

Dear “Endless Dreamer,”

I’m fairly confident that you and I are not the same person. You submitted your letter to the Gazette’s email address from an email account I don’t own and I’ve never seen before. What even is a “psycholaughologist?” And besides, if we were the same person, we wouldn’t need to communicate through my column. I dare say we’d have a more direct line of communication than we could have with anyone else.

As to your philosophical question about dreams…I never really thought about it that way. To me, dreams are like movies. They always exist insofar as you have the potential to have a dream in the same way you have the potential to watch a movie. And while you need to be asleep to start the dream, you need to load up the movie and hot play before you can watch it.

Once the dream is over, it’s like the when the credits roll at the end of a film. Could you watch it again? Sure. But you’ll probably move on to other movies before returning to that one. You can have a dream again—recurring dreams are a thing, after all—but it probably won’t happen right away. When you’re awake, it’s like shutting down your streaming app or sticking the DVD back on the shelf. You might be reminded it’s there, but it isn’t active without your participation. Of course, I could be wrong. About everything. You never know…

–Lovingly, Libby