I moved down here about 1995. This is the longest that I've lived anywhere in my life. London is definitely my home. I work in public engagement part-time, and the rest of the time I am busily trying to write my first novel.

I've always had a really vivid dream life, with dreams that hang around the following day. There are certain dreams that I can still remember years later because they've been so impactful. But since COVID—and I've pretty much been locked in the entire year, because I live with someone who's been shielding—they've got more vivid and more intense as the year has gone on. My sleep as a whole hasn't been great. In fact, I'm really tired today because I didn't sleep very well last night, which I think is a really common phenomenon at the moment. I think a lot of people are struggling either to get to sleep or once they are asleep, maintaining that sleep. I definitely fall in the latter category. But there's some interesting stuff going on in my head when I'm asleep.

The emotions are much more intense. I've always had dreams in which I've kind of lived and breathed within those dreams, if that makes sense. But now they're sharper, the emotions. But also, the images in my head are a lot more defined as well. Quite a few of them have a sort of filmic quality to them. Sometimes they're just bonkers and there's no narrative drive whatsoever, it's just vignettes. But then there have been other times when it's almost like small films are being played in my head, with coherent narratives.

There's been a number that are kind of on a theme, and that theme is travel. Me being in a place that I've never been to before. It's definitely not the UK and it's definitely not London and it's definitely not home. I'm part of the group, but slightly outside it. I remember there was one recently where I was trying to get on a flight back home and the guy at the passport control said, “I won't take your bag unless you give me your passport.” And I was like, “I'm not giving you my passport because you might just run off and steal.” And the passport controller was like, “No, I'm not taking your bag, if don't give me your passport.” I handed it over and then got stuck in this country, this unnamed country.

Then I went to find a flight back home, but all the flights were booked and the only flight that I could get was about 3000 pounds and randomly it was going to Newcastle. In the end, I was like, “Okay, I'll fly to Newcastle.” In the dream, “It's fine because my dad will come and pick me up.” But, my dad's been dead for six years. So that was quite poignant. In the dream, it was kind of like, “My dad will come and get me. Everything's going to be fine.”

There've been some historic ones, like, Second World War and First World War. There's been a lot of yearning. Full of nostalgia. I feel like at times I've been recycling old memories. I think in absence of stimulus—especially living in London—we have such massive stimulus every day, just going into central London on the tube or the bus or the train. Faces everywhere and things to look at and things to see. And over the last year our lives have just got smaller and smaller. So, the external stimulus is not as

present. And so, I feel like I am mining my memories in a way that I haven't mined them for years. Both when I'm awake and also when I'm asleep.

I was just reading an article in a paper about writers talking about how they're feeling really blocked. So many of them feel that it's because we're sponges: writers are sponges and we need to see people and get those little experiences. And because we're not interacting with other human beings—which is essentially the stuff of our story—that we're struggling to write. That really resonated with me, because I feel we've got these mundane lives. It's just all the same. There just isn't that vibrancy, the technicolor of London is just missing.

I miss travel desperately. In the last year, the furthest I have traveled is 20 miles. If you compare that to 2019, I went abroad five times. This feeling of “I can't go anywhere.” I miss the technicolor of London. I miss the whole wide world outside. In my head, I'm going to these places. It's interesting that it's always places that I couldn't put a name to and that I don't recognize. They have a very Latin American feel, which is like my favorite part of the world. They're imbued with that sense of all things Latin. I feel a real heat, which has been lovely when it was freezing outside. But I couldn't say, “Oh, that dream definitely took place in that country.” It's like a kaleidoscope.

The overwhelming feeling is a yearning. It's how they say things in Spanish and French. When they say “I miss something,” they say something like “tu mas manqué." [Literally] “you miss me,” but it [means] the opposite: “I miss you.” It kind of feels like that. I'm not really expressing that properly. It's almost like the place misses me. And I miss it. There's a symbiosis between the two.

I've quite enjoyed it. There have been a number of times I've been falling off to sleep and been thinking to myself, “Well, I wonder where I'm going to go tonight?” It's not my first experience with quite intense dreams. I had a period a couple of years ago, the first time I tried to give up smoking, and I was taking Champix, which is a drug to help you stop smoking. The dreams were absolutely surreal. I really enjoyed those. There were a couple of times I woke up crying with laughing because they were so bonkers.

I think what's really interesting is that I've not dreamt about the pandemic once. Doesn't factor at all. There's not been any sort of anxiety dreams about the pandemic itself. I mean, it's not very nice to feel like you're stuck in the country, however lovely it is. And you just want to go back home. But, I've never had a dream that I would say directly related to the pandemic itself. Or my fears of COVID. For me, dreams have always been an escape. Sleep has always been an escape.

My whole life, I've been a real sleepyhead. I love to sleep. It's where I go to escape. For comfort, and for safety, and to escape. My dad died six years ago, and even during that traumatic experience—because it was completely unexpected—I didn't have any trouble sleeping. And in fact, sleep was where I went to find him, and to find solace.