Last night, I stayed up late and watched Doctor Sleep. As a teen growing up in the 80’s and 90’s, I loved reading scary books before going to sleep. It’s partially why I have so many nightmares. But I think it also is what developed my love for story writing and writing in general.

I love horror movies. But every now and then I need to take a break. I was never a fan of gore or lots of blood in movies. For me, a good horror movie has to have a good plot.

As a kid, movies like Invasion of the Body Snatchers and Alfred Hitchcock’s, The Birds, terrified me.

I’ve written about this scene before – but I’ll leave it here again. This scene still stays with me – all these years later. It’s no wonder I fell in love with Donald and Keifer Sutherland as actors over the years.

By age 13, I had read most of Stephen’s Kings books. The Shining was a terrifying read. The book was so much scarier than the movie.

I actually forgot that Doctor Sleep had come out and saw it trending last night on Twitter. So, I decided to watch it on my not so legal (but still okay in Canada) streaming website.

I won’t give too much of the plot away. Even though the monsters didn’t have a name, “The Shining” refers to a psychic gift or ability that some children have. The gift varies from child to child.

Some can see into the future. Some children can see spirits or evil entities. Some can astral travel while dreaming – or have out of body experiences while wide awake. While one of the main characters of the movie, could jump into other people’s mind and invade their private space.

As someone who astral travels a lot in my sleep this idea disturbed me. And so, I laid awake until about four in the morning almost afraid to even fall asleep.

My dreams are always “out there” weird. I travel to countries I’ve never been. I meet up with people I’ve never met. Once I traveled back in time and followed Mozart around on the cobble streets and watched with amusement as he drunkenly hit on women on his way to his local watering hole.

The dream felt so real. I remember learning in the dream that Mozart died from an infection and my mind ultimately went to syphilis or another STD. In today’s world, these can be cured with pills. In those days, syphilis was a silent killer.

When I woke up from that dream, I hopped online to learn what Mozart had died from. And the cause of death was “unknown infection from high fever.” I looked up his other symptoms and they matched common symptoms of early syphilis.

I laughed at that. The dream had felt so real it was as though I was getting a glimpse into Mozart’s life. I remember the feel of the cool cobblestone on my feet as I carefully stepped in between the stones. I could hear light music in the background and the sound of distant chatter.

So, when I watch movies like Insidious and now Doctor Sleep – it leaves me with all these thoughts and feelings and “what if’s”.

What is we really travel when drift off to sleep? What if our minds tap into other dimensions? There’s very little scientific evidence to back these theories or claims up – but there are lots of studies still being conducted today.

I just wanted to take a moment and acknowledge the casting choices of the Torrance family. Actors hired to play the original family – did a brilliant job. I almost thought that was Jack Nicholson at the end in the hotel. Maybe it was a trick of the cinematography.

Sometimes I wonder if I should write all my dream experiences down and turn them into a book. Question is, would anyone read it? These are thoughts that keep me up at night time.

Doctor Sleep – if you’re a horror fan, check it out. It wasn’t entirely disappointing.