26 Dreams Connie in “Voyage From Lesbos” Had About Genitalia, According to Her Doctor

“Voyage From Lesbos” is a fantasy novel written by a doctor about his intimate and intense relationship with Connie, a lesbian who wants to have sex with him and wishes she was straight. JUST KIDDING. It’s techinically a scholarly book by doctor Richard C. Robertiello, M.D., about his patient, Connie, who he attempted to release from the horrifying grips of homosexuality through the magic of psychoanalysis. This mostly involves him interpreting her dreams, which are often about how much she sexually desires Richard C. Robertiello, M.D., her mother’s bad cooking, how much she hates her Dad and how evil her girlfriend is. Also, according to her doctor, they are often about genitalia!

26 Symbols From Connie’s Dreams That Dr. Richard C. Robertiello, M.D., Determined Were Metaphors for Vaginas or Penises:

A towel rack and a hole in the wall

“I dreamed of a towel rack that had been pulled out of the wall, leaving an ugly, gaping hole. The towel rack itself was a beautiful color in contrast to the ugly hole in the wall.”

Curly Black Hair

“I had a dream about a man and woman of the future. I thought they were supermen and very attractive except for the curly black hair on the women.”

A “milk dispenser”

“I dreamed I was in a restaurant where I stole something — perhaps food, but I wasn’t sure. I remembered that somebody had left some valuable gadgets in the restaurant that were like milk-dispensers… the gadget didn’t work too well but I thought she could get it to work.”

A pocketbook

“I’d forgotten my pocketbook. I was rushing back to get it. I had left a wallet full of money in it. Then I went away for a week on vacation without having found it, and I was frantically worried about where I left it all the time that I was gone. When I found it, it was in front of the house where I was born. I had left it outside so that anyone could come along and grab it.”

A stove

“I had tried to light a stove, but was unable to do so.”

A Big Fish

“A big fish was swimming in the water. He was a big bully and scared everyone.”

A Prong Stuck On a Penny

“I had a penny with a prong on it stuck in me and it was mutilating me.”

Turnips

“We had to eat, but we couldn’t find a place to eat. Then someone in the dream mentioned picking up turnips.”

Indoor Plumbing (again)

“I was on vacation with two gay girls. We had to go to the bathroom, but the bathrooms were either too dirty or else the plumbing was defective.”

A New Red Car

“I got a new red car. I parked it in the middle of God knows where. I was careless about it. When I left, there was a mix-up and some boys stopped me from using it. Then I started to worry about the car being dirty, unkempt, unprotected and uncared for. At one part I thought about parking it in a safe place, but I never got around to it.”

Atomic Bombs

“I was walking in the street. I saw some airplanes and zeppelins flying around. People were talking about dropping bombs. Something indistinguishable dropped from one. I said, My God, the A-bomb or the H-bomb. I lay face down in the street. I was sort of resigned. I said, I hope it comes and I can get it over with quickly.”

A Snake

“It was like a toy snake. It was very long and thin like a rope. It had red eyes. I treated it like a plaything. I said, isn’t it cute? People thought I was crazy. The snake seemed to be performing for people to notice it, like a child. Then I remember I was in a crowded bar. There were a lot of unsavory gay girls around. The snake had the proportions of a rope. A rope is something that would tie me down or strangle me. The women at the bar were big and strapping. The snake was immature. It’s supposed to be the other way around.”

Indoor Plumbing (again)

“The plumbing in my apartment was all disordered.”

Gun in a drawer

“I opened up a drawer and found a gun in it. I think my father expected it to go off and kill me or else it was incriminating evidence that I had killed somebody else.”

Nose and Hypodermic Needle

“I had a cold. I was trying to get some drops for my nose from the pharmacist. He was explaining how to use a hypodermic needle as a dropper.”

A Piano Bench

“A man from work was sitting on my piano bench and leaving stains on it. I tried to tell him tactfully not to do it, but he didn’t seem to care whether he spoiled it or not. Then I got pregnant.”

A Butter Knife

“I was walking down the street with [my girlfriend] Liz and another girl. [My ex] Alice was behind us with some other gay girls. She was waving a butter knife around. I wasn’t afraid of the knife.”

Hairspray

“I was looking for hairspray to keep my hair in place but I couldn’t find it.”

Her Pocketbook (Again)

“I dreamt I misplaced my pocketbook. When I turned around to retrieve it, I noticed a gay girl had run off with it.”

A drill and holes

“She and Princess Margaret were drilling or punching holes in blocks of wood as holders for candles. Connie remembered trying to fit two candles into holes and not succeeding. Princess Margaret asked, “What the hell are you doing here?” implying she was royalty and Connie was nothing.”

A candle

“I caught the head of an outdoor camp trying to light a candle in a glass case. She wasn’t supposed to light the wick because it was dangerous and might cause a fire.”

A gun (again)

“Some man who was dangerous had a gun. Periodically I was able to get the gun away from him, but he would find it. I tried to hide the gun from him, but I couldn’t seem to manage very well.”

Her appendix

“Liz was performing an operation on me. I wanted Liz to remove my appendix at the same time, but Liz refused, which made me very angry.”

Asparagus

“I was visiting Sue. She also had food prepared for me. She opened the refrigerator where there was some cold food — hors d’oeuvres style. There was some asparagus there and some kind of unknown delicacy. I wasn’t able to eat it. I had to leave. I didn’t want to go there, but the train kept going back to Liz’s home town. I thought it was the wrong station, but the train kept going back there.”

A baby elephant

“There was a baby elephant lose in the building. I was very frightened of it.”

Her pocketbook (again)

“I had lost my pocketbook, but I found it and in it was the exact amount of money to pay for one analytic session.”

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Riese

Riese is the 41-year-old Co-Founder of Autostraddle.com as well as an award-winning writer, video-maker, LGBTQ+ Marketing consultant and aspiring cyber-performance artist who grew up in Michigan, lost her mind in New York and now lives in Los Angeles. Her work has appeared in nine books, magazines including Marie Claire and Curve, and all over the web including Nylon, Queerty, Nerve, Bitch, Emily Books and Jezebel. She had a very popular personal blog once upon a time, and then she recapped The L Word, and then she had the idea to make this place, and now here we all are! In 2016, she was nominated for a GLAAD Award for Outstanding Digital Journalism. She's Jewish and has a cute dog named Carol. Follow her on twitter and instagram.

Riese has written 3164 articles for us.

14 Comments

  1. The article is funny. Whatever book it’s excerpting sounds depressing and maddening as hell.

  2. Real voyage to Lesbos: On my last day of my first visit to the island I replaced my passport. About 20 queer woman, one probably straight barkeeper and a nice police officer helped me with my search. A hot greek retail agent did some magic with one of my shirts and my backpack to locate it. I found it one hour before we had to leave for the airport. I would have stayed. But as it is, I return almost every year. Lesbos is where a part of my heart lives. The women festival there is heaven! The headline of this article alone made me happy. Off to read it now.

  3. “We had to go to the bathroom, but the bathrooms were either too dirty or else the plumbing was defective.”

    Approximately 25% of my dreams are about this.

      • I tend to get these dreams when I need to pee in real life. Maybe it’s the brains way of telling you that now is an inappropriate time to be going to the toilet, since you’re actually in your bed and all.

  4. All the dreams I had last night were about cats. No humans appeared at all, just cats. Wonder what Doctor Robertiello would think about that?!?

  5. This post made me sad, the history of psychoanalysis and homosexuality is bleak as hell. I hope everything turned out alright for Connie.

  6. So, did Connie ever stop worrying about society, money and men in order to get on with what she really wanted ?? Come on, plot spoiler needed here – how does this end? I mean, beside dumping the deeply self-centered psycho – analyst – they’re called ‘psycho’ for reason clearly obvious in this case.

  7. Whenever I dream about being in a bathroom that’s too dirty or public or just too weird to use, what it really means is that I need to wake up and go pee already.

  8. What did the psychoanalysts of the past even DO when they encountered patients who didn’t remember their dreams

    Like y’all i never remember my dreams

    Why I do it means my psych who isn’t an analyst changed my mood meds up

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