I am in a dark, dusty music studio, with Camilla, where we’re inspecting an instrument that neither of us has ever seen before. It is a large drum, with a concave middle, like a steel drum, but made entirely from strips of beige leather—about an inch wide—woven together to form the sides AND skin of the drum. Basically it looks like a big wicker basket with a skin that looks like some kind of net. But there is also a wooden peg protruding from the center of the skin, about the size & shape of the top half of a bowling pin (or an erect penis, yes.)

Now the skin of the drum star ts to vibrate (I’m not sure how or why) & emit a high-pitched (but quiet) feedback. Beside the drum we see some hollow metal cones, shaped like par ty hats, & we realize how to ‘play’ the drum: The metal cones are placed on top of the wooden peg, one at a time, each one causing the feedback to lower in pitch (kind of like the water in the singing wineglass thing). We place one cone on the peg. The feedback drops in pitch. We put another cone over the first & the pitch drops even fur ther. We are pleased. But then, within the sound of the feedback, I hear a high, shrill voice say “Oh, my God.” At first I think it’s Camilla, but then realize that the voice came from the drum, or rather, from INSIDE the feedback itself. I ask Camilla if she also heard the voice issue from the humming. She says no. Then the voice says something else that is unclear, or that I can’t remember, but in that moment I know, clearly, that it’s the voice of ‘spirits’ or ‘dream beings.’ Specifically, it is the voice of beings I’d been aggressive toward during lucid dreams of the past. I get the sense that these are just the ‘good’ spirits— ones that didn’t deserve any mistreatment.

Now that I know whom the voice belongs to, I am struck with fear & remorse. I hear the voice again. This time it’s a clear, high pitched, pained & beautiful warble: “We hate your heart.” (Or it may have been “We hate your EVIL heart.”) At hearing the words, I feel terrible, guilty, shamed, & scared. But then almost immediately I sense the spirits become ‘evil,’ & the dream descends into a bad bout of sleep paralysis.