ABSTRACT
Mabel's next letter to Brill reports a dream with imagery derived from San Geronimo Day, an autumn harvest festival at the Taos pueblo where certain Native Americans, the Koshares, celebrate by climbing a tall pole made from a pine tree peeled of its bark, topped with a sheep and harvest products. Although Mabel claimed to have interpreted her dream, she did not present any conclusions to Brill, nor did she mention her ambivalent feelings towards her son during his fall. Her initial anxiety about John's jump from the pole and descent through the air ends with her indifference to his landing, an attitude not far removed from her often distant approach towards him. In Basic Principles of Psychoanalysis, Brill included a section about "Manic-Depressive Psychoses," describing patterns he certainly observed in Mabel. Mabel has just proposed an approach to living guided by downplaying the importance of personal pleasure in an effort to quell potentially destructive urgent feelings.
