My Own Dreams

October 11th, 2011

I had two dreams today. In the first one, I was along a river that ran through a canyon where the walls were covered in mushroom-like plateaus. It felt like I was in a foreign country, Asian maybe. All along the walls of the canyon, poor families had camped on the various plateaus. It was a precarious place to live, the walls of the canyon were fragile and, the water below was fast and full of rocks. There were also strange animals living in the water: huge, shaggy water buffalo that the people living on the river treated like livestock; and river bears that grabbed at anything within reach. At one point in the dream, I felt like I was in the water, the current dragging me past strange rock formations and dodging the buffalo and bears.

Then, I was on one of the plateaus with a small family when the rock gave way and crumbled beneath us. I watched as the mother fell into the water and was swept away. The only one left was a young girl, perhaps ten, and she and I clung to each other on the remaining jut of rock. With the help of others around us, we managed to get to safety. The girl clung to me and cried. Her father was further down the river, working, and it was decided I should take the girl to him and let him know what had happened.

The trip down the river is vague in my dream. I’m not sure how we traveled but, we came to a camp where the workers stayed. The girl was taken in to the camp but I was kept out. I watched as she disappeared into the crowd. Her father found me then and I remember him walking towards me. That’s when my alarm went off.

Instead of getting up, I reset my alarm (I thought…I did it wrong and overslept) and went back to sleep. In my second dream, it felt like I was in the house on Staten Island but, it was different. The floor plan was basically the same but the rooms felt like the wrong size or shape and the furniture was distorted. I walked into the living room and there were a couple of computer stations set up. I went over to my favorite one (in my dream-head) and tried to log on for work. Owen was already logged on but, he was also logged on at another computer; he also wasn’t at either of them because he was hanging out in the kitchen. I went in and asked him to log off of one of the computers so that I could work. He waved me off with a vague sort of assent but, he made no move to comply, simply continuing his conversation. I walked back into the living room and noticed another computer set up on the round table. I yelled, “never mind” at Owen and went over to use that one. When I got there, the table was really tall, almost at eye level, so I had to adjust the chair to be able to reach the keyboard. My feet dangled a couple of feet off the floor.

Someone came in to the room and told me that my mother wanted me in my bedroom. I went down the hall and into the room where she was rearranging furniture. The room was different than I remembered it, with the windows in different walls and a door to the outside. She had a large, canopied bed that was going against the wall, blocking the outside door. I told her I didn’t like it, that it felt claustrophobic. She ignored me and continued to rearrange things. I felt so uncomfortable that I thought I was going to be sick. I left the room.

Next, we were in the dining room and my mom brought in a man, the actor who is playing Hawkeye in the new Avengers movie (I looked him up: Jeremy Renner). She introduced him to me with a significant look. I was trying to fix the ring I was wearing. It had four diamonds, set in rings of metal instead of prongs, forming a square in the center with a few smaller ones trailing off to the sides. One of the diamonds’ settings had small hinges to the side and it kept swiveling out of place. I couldn’t figure out why it wouldn’t stay in place. He asked if he could look at it and then, after studying it, he looked at me hand. Stuck to my palm was a miniscule piece of gold wire. He picked it up, held the jewel in place, and threaded the wire through a small tube. It held the diamond in place.

Afterward, my mom pulled me into the bedroom. The room was completely rearranged again, with a bench and a dresser against the wall with the door, the bed opposite and the whole room decorated with purple and white florals. It looked like something out of a Martha Stewart magazine. She asked me what I thought of the guy she had brought home. I told her he was nice but that it didn’t matter, because of Greg. She argued with me, insisting that her guy was a return missionary. I went in to the bathroom and started cleaning but, I began to feel really ill. My throat hurt when I breathed and I felt dizzy and feverish. I looked up and the guy was standing in the doorway, holding my ring. I told him to stay back because I was sick. I sat down on the floor and leaned against the bathtub. He came over to me and put his hand on my forehead. He looked at me, smiled like he understood then, he handed me back my ring. I almost put it on the ring finger of my left hand but, I stopped myself. Then, I tried to put it on the pinky of my right hand but it was too big. I switched it to my ring finger on that hand. When I finally looked up, he had left.

I walked out of the bathroom and toward the front door. My mom was putting together a large banner and handed me pieces of the stand to fit together while she attached the banner to it with tape. I looked at the banner and it was about Harry Potter. Underneath that one, she attached a second banner announcing a room for rent (my room). We took the banner outside where my father set it up in the lawn. Crowds of people started to gather. My mom had a Harry Potter-themed contest and a young man with a lot of hair won. I was worried about having to share my room with a man but, my mother insisted it was only temporary until she found someone better.

My mom began telling me that her and my dad wanted to buy a bed & breakfast and turn it into a shop. She didn’t want it to feel like a shop, she wanted to keep the place looking like a home/inn but, she would discreetly display items for sale among the furnishings. As she was describing it, I found myself standing in a bed & breakfast like the one she described. I walked up to the counter and the woman asked if I was joining them for the party. She directed me toward a sun room where a number of people were sitting around. They were all neighbors from the small town we were in. There was an older bachelor, a young couple with a small child, some older, gossipy ladies and a few others. It was supposed to be a murder-mystery weekend but someone had actually been killed, a young woman. The man with the small child was arguing with his wife because she was accusing him of being involved with the victim.

I took the little girl and we went into another room, away from the fighting. I left her there and went back to the counter, looking for the child’s backpack. The woman there tried to get me interested in some pendants she had on sale from a local artist. She described how they were made from fabrics even though they looked like semi-precious stones. I was studying one that she explained was made from wool when a couple of men walked in. One was tall and muscular, obviously a police detective. The other one was small and nervous. The police officer introduced the small, nervous man as the medical examiner and asked to see the body. At this point, the man who was arguing with his wife came into the lobby and started loudly explaining to the detective how he had nothing to do with anything that was going on.

That’s when I woke up.