“I am writing this post to honor the eighty-first birthday of Mike McCartney.” You have just read the winner of my recent How to Start this Blog Post competition. Here are the other contenders, and why I rejected them:

• “Mike McCartney, a.k.a. Mike McGear, is the younger, better-looking, more stylish brother of Paul McCartney.” (too self-deprecating)
• “Sibling relationships are complicated—especially if you die, you’re replaced by a lookalike, your brother accepts him in your stead, and you witness it all from your next lifetime.” (too metaphysical)
• “When Paul McCartney was a teenager, he ate too many cakes; his brother, Mike, called him ‘Fatty.’”  (too grudgy)
• “In a 1964 magazine interview, Paul McCartney identified one of his ultimate ambitions as to invest in his brother’s hairdressing business.” (too random)
• “Photos taken by Mike McCartney are held in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery in London.” (too boastful)

In an earlier post, I alluded to a dream memory I had with Mike, which I was able to confirm using a photograph—taken by Mike! I thought it might be fun, in recognition of Mike’s day of origin, to describe that dream along with other sleepy-time adventures I’ve had with him and additional members of the Beatles’ inner circle. These dreams occurred between April 2022 and January 2024.

What’s a Dream Memory Again?

In prior posts, I talked a bit about dream memories and provided some examples. Dream memories are recollections of past lives that occur during slumber and are sourced from the subconscious. When we’re born, we bring subconscious memories of our prior incarnations with us. For small children, these hidden remembrances might bubble up, occasionally, to the level of conscious awareness. As we get older, however, our waking access to past-life memories tends to diminish and disappear. But the memories are still there, behind the scenes, coloring our perception.

You could think of our amnesia for past lives as a hypnotic suggestion, implanted right before we incarnate. Imagine being a soul, just about to slide down an etheric “chute” into your future mommy’s “tummy”—where you will join up with your six- or seven-month-old form. At this moment, you receive the following mental instruction: “Once you exit the womb, your mind will be free from all memories of previous incarnations.”

And let’s face it: it’s hard enough to deal with the stuff that happens in one lifetime without the weight of hundreds or even thousands of years of personal history on your shoulders.

While we may not be able to call up past-life memories at will, we might encounter them in dreams—which pull from the subconscious, where those memories live. That’s the only way I can explain the numerous dreams I’ve had as the original Paul McCartney and other past selves. Sometimes, as I’m falling asleep, I’ll ask for a dream memory. But I almost never get one. My subconscious “gives” me a dream memory if and when it wants to. I can only accept that it knows best.

As a reminder, when I have a dream memory from Paul McCartney’s life, I might be Paul. Or I might be someone else in the scene. Or I might be a third-person observer. For a while now, I have been receptive to the idea that we are all one, even if we appear to be separate. My experience with dream memories bears this out: our shared subconscious can assume the perspective of any person or any point in existence.

Seeing Paul in the Mirror

Probably the easiest way to know who you are in a dream is to look in a mirror! That’s what I did on April 28, 2022:

This morning, I had a dream that I looked in the mirror and saw Paul McCartney. In the dream, I didn’t quite realize I was seeing Paul. I had a mop-top haircut. My hair looked quite soft and smooth. I thought, in the dream, that if I held my lips in a certain way, I could look like John (Lennon). Then I thought I could look like any of the Beatles. My features were pleasant; I especially noticed my lips, which looked soft. I saw only my face in the mirror; I’m not sure if that was all of me the mirror showed or if my focus was simply on my face…

I guess my subconscious thought I could use a little affirmation of my former identity. As I recalled the dream [later],…a particular photo came to mind—of myself, as Paul McCartney, on the set of THE ED SULLIVAN SHOW in 1964.

As far as why I wasn’t surprised to see Paul McCartney’s face in the mirror, I wouldn’t have looked in the mirror [on the set of THE ED SULLIVAN SHOW] and thought, “Oh my God! It’s Paul McCartney!” I would have thought, “There’s my mug. This performance is really important. Don’t [eff] it up.” It’s hard to know why I imagined myself as able to look like John, George, or Ringo…maybe the idea is that anyone with that haircut would look like a Beatle. It wasn’t like one of those nightmares in which you look in the mirror and you don’t look like yourself.

Two months later, on June 26, 2022, I had another “mirror” dream (which I recorded in my journal the following day):

Yesterday, I had a dream in which I could feel my face changing, transforming. I watched it happen in a mirror. My face became an amalgam of the original Paul McCartney and Karen Greenfield. That was the thought I had in my mind.

When I see a photo of the original Paul McCartney, my former self, I look, look, look for any kind of physical resemblance to myself now, as Karen. Sometimes I get a hint, below the surface, coming out from within; but there are only minimal surface resemblances.

I have noted a few outward similarities between me (as Karen) and Paul: a high forehead, a narrow palate, and hair that parts naturally on the left. In my incarnations, I am usually a woman who looks very much like I do now: pale, petite, fair-haired. Being a relatively tall, dark-haired man with a cute nose was quite a departure for me! I’m pretty sure I rocked it though, right? (As Paul, I was “designed” to resemble the man who would one day replace me, and who was born five years before I was.) In this lifetime, as Karen, I am very “on brand” for me; sometime, I’ll show you images of me through the ages, and you’ll have a good laugh.

A Dream Memory from Paul’s Childhood

On July 22, 2023, I had an unusual dream that seemed to depict an early experience in Paul McCartney’s life:

I had some interesting McCartney-related dreams this morning…

In the second dream, I was looking in a large-format book that had moving pictures; when I would open to a spread, the image that spanned both pages would come to life. I looked at two spreads that showed black-and-white photos of a children’s birthday party from an earlier era. I especially remember a girl in a white dress with blonde hair, but there were probably about two dozen children, about eight to ten years old, in the photos. They were dancing—literally moving, as if the photos were videos.

I felt like I was the little boy whose party it was; the dance was a contest, and I was supposed to be picking the best dancer. My father—Jim McCartney—was urging me to choose a winner; I guess I was taking too long to decide.

I am reasonably certain this dream was showing me the birthday party of a young Paul McCartney, who was particularly taken with a blonde girl in a white dress.

Three Dream Memories with Mike

I am going to share a trio of dream memories I’ve had with my brother from another mother, Mike McCartney. I wonder if Mike is having a celebratory dinner tonight, for his birthday. In that spirit, I will start with an “appetizer.” On November 28, 2022, I documented the following snippet:

I had an interesting dream last night in which I had become “known,” and I was in a large room with a number of other people; I was waiting for Mike McCartney to come in, and I was going to give him a hug.

Collective “awwww” for the bond between brothers. Was this dream a recollection from the première for the Beatles’ 1964 feature film A Hard Day’s Night? Paul attended with his father, his brother, and a bevy of aunties. In this photo taken during the event, Paul seems to be showing off his family, quite proudly.

Moving on to the “main course,” on July 27, 2023, five days after witnessing Paul’s birthday party, I recounted the following dream:

I dreamt that I was observing (the original) Paul McCartney in a small boat. I was slightly above, looking down on him in the boat. It was as if I was on a platform, looking down on him in the water. His hair was dark and seemingly quite long, as I viewed him from the side… Paul was moving around a bit and laughing. I heard some chatter in an English accent.

[Upon waking reflection, I realized] that I was viewing a memory, the one of Paul and Mike taking pictures of each other, looking like Elvis, in a boat. I think Paul’s hair looked so long from the side because it was in a pompadour style. I’ll see if I can find a photo from this “shoot.” [I switched to first-person here:] We were quite young, I think.

Okay, here’s the photo I remembered. Now I see why my hair looked so long from the side: the collar of my dark jacket was popped, and in my dream, the popped collar looked like an extension of my hair. Apparently, Mike and I were on the boating lake in Sefton Park, in Liverpool, shortly before the Beatles became popular. I couldn’t read any more of the article accompanying the photo because it quoted [my replacement] as saying he had “many happy memories” of rowing on that lake.

I never know when my subconscious will give me these little gems.

I am especially convinced the foregoing dream was a genuine memory because I was able, using a photo, to explain part of it I didn’t understand.

And now for the bittersweet “dessert.” On August 19, 2023, about three weeks after the “boat dream,” I saw a fragment of a scene in my sleep, which I reported the following day:

Yesterday morning, I had a dream I barely remembered. The only part I seemed to recall was seeing a male youth from an earlier era, dressed up, and possibly standing on a grassy area beneath a tree. The coloration was generally gray or brown…

I struggled to figure out what the dream might have been about… I figured out that the boy was Mike, and I was viewing our mother’s funeral. I didn’t see other mourners, though. Learning about this dream last night prompted raucous weeping on my part.

Mary McCartney’s burial took place on November 3, 1956, at Yew Tree Cemetery, on Finch Lane, in Liverpool. Is it possible that only Jim, Paul, and Mike were in attendance? That seems so unlikely. To quote myself, in my journal, Paul, “for one, would have appreciated an auntie’s bosom to be comforted against.” But maybe Jim McCartney knew he wouldn’t be able to find his brave face that day, so he limited the service to the three grieving residents of 20 Forthlin Road.

What’s a Dream Encounter?

I have never tried to define this phenomenon before, but I will do my best: A dream encounter is a meeting, in a dreamscape, between two or more beings, at least one of whom is asleep. Perhaps the most commonly reported examples of dream encounters are visits from deceased loved ones—which are usually quite welcome. I can’t speak to how dream encounters work. But I will say that I never consciously seek them out, for the following reason.

In a dream encounter with another living person, in which both of you are asleep, each comes face to face with the other’s subconscious. According to Sigmund Freud, the famed founder of psychoanalysis, the subconscious is home to the id: the source of instinctual needs and drives. So, when you’re in someone else’s dream, or someone else is in your dream, the urge-driven parts of your souls are meeting. Fortunately, the superego may choose to intervene on behalf of civility.

I have found that, in dream encounters, a subconscious might be gentle and friendly—or vicious and aggressive, without any boundaries. And the “mood” of a subconscious can change from one encounter to the next. To me, the dangers of dream encounters far outweigh any conceivable benefits. My hope is that they are exceedingly rare, despite how regularly they seem to occur in my life.

There is nothing scary or bad about the dream encounters I am about to describe.

Dream Encounters with Mike, Peter, and Ringo

Almost exactly two years ago, on January 6, 2023, I had a lighthearted dream encounter with Mike McCartney:

Earlier in the evening, shortly after I went to bed, I woke up around 1:30 from a dream with Mike! In the dream, Mike and I were talking on the phone, though we were also in person together. I don’t think we said anything important—just some silly stuff… My sister was there at the end, too.

I think Mike was in my dream, because my sister showed up—a creation of my subconscious, nicely enhancing the sibling vibe. Assuming Mike was in England at the time, this dream encounter would have occurred on the morning before his seventy-ninth birthday—a gift of sorts?

About a month later, on February 11, 2023, I had an intriguing dream encounter with Peter Asher—whom I have talked about quite a bit in previous posts. In the 1960s, Peter Asher and Paul McCartney were fellow musicians as well as housemates, and Paul was engaged to marry Peter’s sister, Jane. Nowadays, Peter Asher hosts a show on The Beatles Channel, on SiriusXM. I used to be able to listen to The Beatles Channel, before I discovered who I had been. After that, I couldn’t stomach hearing the songs recorded after Paul McCartney’s death, or references to Paul and his replacement as the same person.

This morning, I was in a dream with Peter Asher. The setting seemed to be a banquet of sorts, so I think it was HIS dream. I don’t often dream about banquets. In the dream, I was sitting across from Peter at a round table. He seemed middle-aged, probably a bit younger than he is now. His eyes flared into an intense blue and then resolved into a lighter, clearer blue. When his eyes were intense blue, I had the thought they were the color of mine. I told him, “You’re seeing me, but you’re not really seeing me.” I meant, you see me, but you don’t realize I used to be Paul McCartney. I woke up a little after 4 a.m. I wasn’t sure he ever recognized me.

Two Aprils in a row, I had dream encounters with Ringo Starr, the Beatles’ very famous drummer. I reported the first one in my journal on April 25, 2022:

Ringo was in my dream this morning… I was sitting on my bed. My sister was sitting next to me, closer to the edge of my side of the bed. I was using a spoon to eat from a small bowl of soup that had a grain, like quinoa, at the bottom, along with some broth. Then Ringo was there, next to my sister. He looked younger than he does now; he didn’t have a beard, as he does now. The idea, and I’m not sure who said it, was that Ringo had made the soup. The idea came into my head that, when I am ready, I can seek him out. I dissolved out of the dream right after that and was awake. It was about 6:30. I wonder if it was really Ringo.

I don’t know what the soup in the dream might have represented. Ringo had made it, so I suppose it conveyed a sense of nourishment and care coming from him.

My dream with Ringo almost exactly one year later, on April 23, 2023, was a little less homey (no wholesome soup) and a bit more surreal (meandering skunks). The driving force behind this second dream encounter with Ringo was to establish privacy between us, so we could talk:

This morning, I had a dream with Ringo. We were on a large lawn, with other people. At one point, we were sitting at a table together. In my mind, we were trying to establish some privacy so we could speak about the current situation. I saw Ringo in the near distance talking to a man; I think he was asking the man to give us some privacy. There was a dark-haired woman sitting with her back to me, at a picnic table nearby; I wondered if she should leave, too. I was trying to round up some animals on the lawn, and a skunk walked right past my feet. I went to a room that seemed like my old bedroom in Encino [in Los Angeles County, in California] and got a guitar; I brought it out to a paved section next to the lawn and set it up on a stand; it had some kind of packaging on it. There were more people now. I stopped next to Ringo and touched his arm. Then I woke up. It was around 5 a.m.

I wonder if Ringo has a large lawn, where he hosts large lawn parties, which he sometimes dreams about.

A Curious “Dream” with Jane

In my last post, I offered some insights into the relationship between Paul McCartney and Jane Asher; I don’t know how close to the truth I came. The most recent dream I am presenting in this post took place almost exactly one year ago, on January 5, 2024. In the dream, I seemed to be having a vision of Jane, in the past:

Earlier, I had a dream with or about Jane Asher. In the dream, I was in an expansive outdoor area like a park. I saw Jane in the distance, in a space surrounded by a chain-link fence. She was with at least one other woman—a blonde, I think. Jane’s red hair was long, with long bangs swept back and longer hair underneath. She looked young. I knew she was too far away to notice or hear me, so I talked to her in her mind. I said, “I’m alive! It’s Paul.” (This was said in JPM’s [James Paul McCartney’s] voice.) Jane replied immediately, and with excitement: “Paul!” That’s all I remember.

I don’t know if this was a dream memory, a dream encounter, or just a regular old dream. At the very end, though, Jane and I seemed to be communicating in the present, perhaps mind-to-mind.

In May 2022, I had an extraordinary dream encounter with the iconic singer Tony Bennett; he passed away about fourteen months later. I was able to verify an aspect of the dream that I hadn’t known earlier, shocking even myself! I want to tell you that story sometime. But today is Mike’s day.

Let Him In

When Paul McCartney died, he left behind a song in progress called “Let ’Em In”—a tribute to the warm, convivial family gatherings he had enjoyed since youth. You might know this ditty from its opening lines: “Someone’s knockin’ at the door / Somebody’s ringin’ the bell.” Paul’s replacement released “Let ’Em In” with Wings, in 1976; as a single, it reached number two in the UK, and number three in the United States. But the biggest thrill for me, related to this song, is that one of my favorite singer-songwriters, Freedy Johnston, recorded a cover of it for his 2007 album My Favorite Waste of Time.

In the Wings version of “Let ’Em In,” Paul’s replacement pronounces “auntie” (at 1:51 and 2:39) as Americans usually do, probably because he grew up in the United States. I wonder if Paul would have pronounced “auntie” as Brits typically do. You can hear the two ways of pronouncing “aunt” here.

The three nearly identical verses of “Let ’Em In,” represented below by the first one, list the guests to be “let in”:

Sister Susie, Brother John
Martin Luther, Phil and Don
Brother Michael, Auntie Jin
Open the door, and let ’em in

I think Paul might have intended to introduce more variety in the individuals mentioned throughout the song. But in this first verse, “Phil and Don” are almost certainly Phil and Don Everly, who performed as the American rock duo the Everly Brothers—surely a favorite of Paul’s when he was growing up in the 1950s. Perhaps “Sister Susie” is a nod to the Everly Brothers’ chart-topper “Wake Up Little Susie” (1957).

“Auntie Jin” is well-known as one of Paul’s beloved aunts, on his father’s side. “Brother John” could be a reference to bandmate Lennon. I suspect “Martin Luther” (as in the German theologian) is a placeholder that satisfies the meter.

And, of course, “Brother Michael” is Paul’s brother, Mike, born Peter Michael McCartney, eighty-one years ago today.

Happy Birthday, Brother Michael!

CREDIT: The photo at the top of this post shows Paul McCartney and his brother, Mike, at EMI Studios, in London, on June 3, 1964—the day before the Beatles set off on a world tour. A number of recordings were made that day—sans Ringo, who was ill. The photo is copyright © Larry Ellis. I apologize to Mr. Ellis for violating his copyright, but I really liked this photo and wanted to use it to illustrate the closeness between Paul and Mike, with the younger visiting the elder at his place of business. I find it amusing that the brothers’ expressions are diametrically opposed, with each man committed to his look: Paul giving wide-eyed wonder, Mike evincing eagle-eyed certainty. I doubt there is any deep meaning here, just two bros mugging for the camera. I also love this photo, taken by Ellis the same day: Paul, a huge grin on his face, is raising Mike’s arm and giving a thumbs-up, in seeming approval of his brother.