A rented flat

It's nagging at me again. The unconscious or whatever it is that nags at you through dreams. I get the impression that it wants me to pay attention to something when a thread or theme runs through several dreams, but all I can recall are fragments.

A rented flat featured in a couple. Not a flat that I've ever actually lived in but a mean and shabby little bolt-hole with unfamiliar things in it. I had a suitcase with me and was annoyed to find I'd brought an inappropriate selection of clothing so it's clear I wasn't living there. In a more recent dream I had trouble pronouncing my own name which had changed for no reason that I knew of. It had a similar feel to the flat dreams, a sense of dislocation.

Cube library

It's like a cross between a Borg cube and a library. Each of the small cube shaped rooms that make up the whole is lined with books. I'm in the central cube, it's not well lit, the books appear to be old.

Wrong station

Got off the train at the wrong station. There were bears in the waiting room.

Forces

I'm not sure who they are, but someone tells me they're the Norwegian army. They're telling us what to do in a high-handed threatening manner but they don't do any more than threaten even when resisted or openly provoked.

Fragments

Only fragments and isolated images lately.

Reckless flying

In the air again. This time in a small plane being flown by female friend. We arrived in the vicinity of our destination, flew a few rather wild loops and made a steep descent. Backwards. Which seemed a little reckless and unlikely to end well. But we landed safely in a field just outside of Tesco. (I could not make these up!) So I got out and went shopping.

Red room

A red room. Red carpet, walls, curtains, ceiling. Even the air seems tinged with it.

When I noted this down I didn't recall the HG Wells story, but I think I must have read it. Reading it now it seems very familiar so I would not be surprised if there is a connection.

Undergound: a fragment

A journey on an underground railway. The tunnels leading to the platform are so low that people have to walk stooped. On getting into the train it's a relief to sit. I have no feeling of claustrophobia, just a vague annoyance at the limited space.

Round trip

Somehow the person I was with had taken over the controls in flight. After flying for some distance he managed to land the plane on water and we got to the shore. Suddenly it occurred to me that we might not be able to get back. I asked him if he knew how to start the plane again. He said it was alright, we could go home in the car. I wasn't happy about this, not feeling safe in the fast car on the narrow roads.

It seems strange now - but didn't in the dream - that I felt more unsafe in the car that the other person was confident about driving, than in the plane that I knew he didn't really know how to control.

--

Why don't I trust the ground? Am I right or wrong not to trust it? Does flight in these dreams symbolise 'flight of fantasy' or 'flight from the mundane'?

I know, and knew in my dream, that flying is considerably safer than driving.

Desert ship

A high, narrow wooden walkway led to an old wooden structure, perhaps a ship. It seemed to be beside the sea or the sand but it was very bright and it was hard to see for all the light. The tide may have been out, or it may have been in the desert. I couldn't be sure if the inhabitants were lawyers or lifeboatmen. They gave the impression of carrying on an ancient, venerable tradition. Something more than just their lifetimes had been dedicated to this. Someone described it to me as a world apart. I was unsure what to do, or how to behave. It was very dry and hot and there were drinks on the table - orange juice and something that looked like beer. I didn't know which, if any, to take. It wasn't a matter of following specific set rules, but of finding how to live in the right way, and I didn't know how. I moved from the brightness a little into the shade. I realised that the knowledge I had was of very little use here. The inhabitants continued with their business in the area where I was sitting and in an area below two of them were discussing an arcane point that I couldn't understand. They were polite but took very little notice of my presence among them.

This dream seemed significant enough to make me start recording my dreams.

Stone slide

I'm thinking about the speaker who referred to a building with a long slide in it, put there to encourage a playful, creative environment. I'm surprised to remember that our building has a slide, and I go to look for it. The floors are all empty and it's very quiet as I make my way up the stairs. I find the entrance to the top of the slide and it's not a shiny metal tube, like the one the speaker showed, it looks like smooth, pale stone with very large sculptural curves. It goes right through the centre of the building. I slide down it and find that I can easily control my speed by making very slight movements.

Mr X

Disconcerting dream fragment in which I agree, finally, after much resistance, and with a definite sense of relief, that I should marry Mr X. Mr X is someone I used to know. He does not appear in the dream himself. I seem to be agreeing with a group of people but none of them are identifiable individuals.

Is there something that Mr X personifies for me that I lack, and need to be more open to?

Something nasty

On the steps of a rather grand town house a man with a bucket pours something congealed and nasty down the steps into the basement.

A mad scene where the congealed and nasty stuff has flooded out everywhere and people are slipping and sliding in it. A man is very angry and shouting, insisting that someone be employed to shovel it away and clean it up. No one would want to do it but he rants that you should look for someone with no other option, someone with this issue or that. He lists several. Someone nods and winks and says 'Or someone with ALL of those issues!

Changing

I'm in a queue for what appears to be a changing room. The person at the front of the queue has not pulled the curtain across but I can't really see what she's doing anyway. I'm distracted because the person behind is pushing me forward. When I get to the front of the queue and the line where the curtain would be I resist and won't be pushed any further.

The person behind me then takes a paper from a large official looking envelope she's carrying, gives it to me, and starts to wander off. I look at the paper and can't tell what it is, but I know I don't want it. I go after her and try to give it back but she doesn't want to take it. I say to her that it's clearly an important document and she should take it. She still won't, so I push it back into the envelope she's holding.

--

I take the first part of this to mean that I won't be pushed into changing faster than I want to! Don't get the second part though.

Hmm. Yes. It does help to write these things down and think about them! How ironic that I said I 'didn't get' the second part. Of course I didn't - that's exactly the point - I wouldn't (won't) 'get' it - even though I said myself that it was 'an important document'!

Landing

Back to the flying dreams again. Coming in to land this time past a long row of dark tenement buildings that are being demolished. Large sections have fallen away from the end of the row, leaving gaping holes and the ground is littered with debris. A disused railway line runs below, the tracks are rusted.

The office

I haven't had any flying dreams lately. I'm having a different kind now. I'm going to work in a new town. I don't know my way around and I don't know the people. I know the name of the company and manage to find the building but once inside there is nothing I recognise. I don't know what I'm supposed to do, but I know that admitting to that would not be good. I have to carry on as if I have no doubts at all. I avoid talking to anyone but when I listen l notice that all the conversations are evasive, sliding away from specifics, avoiding the definite. No one makes eye contact.

Going... down?

"Do I have to go down to go up?" That's what I remember thinking. The lift was an open platform, suspended on the side of the building. It was quite a way below the floor I was on and I was trying to judge if it was safe to jump down. I thought it was, but I clearly wouldn't be able to climb or jump back up again once down there. I'd have to trust the lift to bring me up. There was no other way to get to the floors above.

Flying

For years now I've had recurring dreams around the theme of flying. They happen so regularly they're becoming difficult to ignore, and even within the dreams I sometimes get the feeling they are way beyond subtle hints and are definitely trying to get something through to me.

The one I've had lately that especially gave me that feeling was about taxiing for so long I went off the runway and down a street between buildings and round a roundabout with the normal road traffic. The feeling around that one was, 'how obvious does this have to be for you to get it?'

Previous to that there was a very vivid one where I was coming in to land and found the ground a scene of devastation with whole sections of the runway broken and up-ended at sharp angles. It was obvious that the only safe place was up.

Earlier dreams were mostly about skimming over tree tops and buildings, trying to gain height but being unable to.

I'm not flying like a bird with wings in these dreams, and I'm not flying a plane, nor am I a passenger. It's more as if I am the plane. I'm never afraid of crashing, although I have a strong sense of frustration at not being able to gain more height.

It seems clear that I'm telling myself something about not feeling able to reach my potential, but there's more to it than that and I can't quite get a hold of it.

Launching the Lifeboat

Over the last few years I've had a series of dreams with recurring themes which have become more and more insistent in calling for my attention, so I've decided to start writing them down. I'm going to capture a few particularly insistent ones from before the time the journal actually starts and then go on to record them as they happen.