Hodgepodge of Dreams

Sometimes dreams appear in seemingly unrelated segments and yet they flow from one place to the next and from one occurrence to the next. Here is an example of a hodgepodge dream.

I am at my daughter's and her boyfriend's apartment, but it doesn't look like their apartment. Somebody unexpected comes for a visit and then somehow lots of kids show up. The kids run out into the hallway to play. In waking life, my daughter doesn't have a hallway outside her apartment. The hallway in the dream is quite large.

The apartment suddenly turns into a classroom. Students enter and take their seats. I watch them from the back of the classroom. After a while all of the students get angry with me because I'm supposed to be teaching them. I try to explain to them that I'm not supposed to be teaching them, because I wasn't hired to teach them – I haven't taught in years – but they don't believe me. 

I leave the building and enter an enclosed walkway between the inside of the building and the parking lot. As I'm still in the walkway, I see a dog try to push the door open from the inside. He is becoming more and more successful. About 30 other dogs follow him, enter the walkway, and start chasing me. I run and I panic because not only am I allergic to dogs, but with so many following me, I'm afraid they might attack me.

Somehow I make it safely outside but then realize on my way back to the building, possibly from my car, but I don't remember walking to the car or being in a car, that the weather has changed significantly. I am slipping and sliding everywhere. A small sheet of ice covers the ground and a light misty snow is blowing everywhere. My mother is upstairs and I have to tell her to be careful when she comes outside.

When I get upstairs I walk to a room to get my coffee. A woman tells me that the kids were extremely noisy and disruptive, especially one of my grandchildren, and that everyone is quite upset with me. I return to the classroom that was once my daughter's apartment and sit with my mother. It occurs to me that even though I'm not supposed to be teaching, I could still teach the class, but now it's too late.

I am now carrying a baby (I don't know how I got the baby) that I have to return to his or her family. I expect the mother or father to rush up to greet the baby, but nobody does. I feel sad that nobody is greeting this baby as I place the baby in a cradle. The dream ends.

A dream like the one above is so difficult to interpret, because it has so many elements. That the daughter's apartment morphed into an educational facility could mean that I (the dreamer) learn a lot through my daughter. We often think that parents are supposed to teach our children, when the truth is, they teach us.

Dreams where classrooms appear generally indicate that the dreamer is supposed to be learning something. We often come across challenges that we see as obstacles that make us angry, but we know on a spiritual level that we are supposed to learn from them. Yesterday I spent the better part of the morning trying to get a printer to work. It never did. I now have three printers, none of which work. In my anger, I ask, what am I supposed to learn from this? In my sarcasm, I answer, that I am never for the rest of my life allowed to print!

I have to become more resourceful. Since I can no longer print, I will handle everything through email. If I need a scan or a print of something, I will take a photo of it. So though I threw a fit over the fact that ONE MORE THING broke on me, I can pat myself on the back for coming up with a way to fix the problem, if not the printer.

Significant weather changes could mean that something significant in my life is changing. My daughter is getting married. That could be one change. Three of my screenplays are entered into contests, the results of which won't be determined until October. Winning even one of them would significantly change my own personal atmosphere. So many opportunities abound. So many possibilities exist. Though change may seem unsettling at first, we ultimately have to accept it and move on.

The potential danger of slipping on ice during an unexpected change of weather after being chased by dogs means being aware of my surroundings and treading carefully through unfamiliar territory. Any number of changes can take place and I have to prepare myself for those changes.

The baby, too, could represent any number of things. Maybe my daughter and her boyfriend will eventually have a baby. Since the dream started at her apartment, it could mean her baby, but I can't imagine her not greeting the baby with hugs and a desire to hold the baby upon his or her return. 

So maybe the baby represents something else. Maybe one of my screenplays is my baby. Nobody ever greets my screenplays with the enthusiasm I would like to see. Let me rephrase that last statement. Nobody who can get movies made from one of my screenplays seems to notice its worth – YET – I love that word – it holds within those three little letters, lots of hope.

Do you have a weird dream? Send it to weirddreams@mail.com.