Sunday, October 6, 2013

Something's Got A Hold of Me


The Dream:
I was startled awake by this nightmare. Clark and I are in bed, asleep. Our dog, Toffee, comes bounding in and jumps on the bed between us. He clamps his teeth onto my finger and won't let go. I scream again and again for Clark's help; he doesn't respond. Finally, screaming over and over, “Clark, you aren't paying attention to me!” I awaken, feeling very shaken.

Interpretation: On the surface this dream seems to be saying that I feel neglected by my husband, and that could certainly be one of its meanings. But the level of terror I experienced in the dream hints at another meaning. I've been grabbed by the instinctive (my animal, the dog) and it won't relent. The rational (Clark, my animus) ignores the problem.

The dog in the dream, Toffee, died some years ago, and the terror the dream conjures seems consistent with a primal fear such as that of dying. What might have triggered this nightmare? Last night I was reading George Eliot's “Daniel Deronda.” In the book the character Gwendolyn responds with terror to a painting of a dead face and someone fleeing.

2 comments:

  1. Hello Carla

    Rather than make my usual type of comment I though it might be interesting to respond to your dream by proffering one of my old dreams. I'm prompted to do this because on reading your dream my old dream immediately came to mind. I won't make any observations on either dream as I thought it might instructive to see of the two dreams might "speak to one another" in some way. So here it is:

    Dream 197b: Catch Ottery Thing at Four?

    We are now up on some wild moorland and involved in a hunt for an agile ferret or otter like creature. We eventually manage to grab it by the tail. It seems very slippery. I expect to lose my grip at any moment but to my amazement I am able to hold on until the others arrive. We wrap it up in an old raincoat. We now have it secure. I don’t think it will escape again.

    In good faith, as ever.

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  2. Thank you, Openfoot! It will be interesting to see if either of our dream generators are inspired by these dreams.

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