Time to Get Rid of Tired Old Ideas

The Dream: My uncle S is a very old, decrepit man. He walks bent over and is housebound, yet his spirit is domineering, his voice is strong, and he's calling the shots. My daughter, about 5 years old, needs a home and I've “placed” her with him. She comes to me saying he's kicked her out; he has someone older, an adolescent girl who can do chores. I wonder if he has a dirty old man's interest in an attractive teenager.

I realize I need to find a new home for my child, but resent this intrusion into my work-a-day world. I have so many projects—now this! But I soon realize what my true priority should be: taking care of my child.

Interpretation: This uncle represents the stern, unattractive  side of my animus, my own internalized patriarch. Forty years of feminism have weakened him, but his voice remains strong, and he has made no place for the feminine except as a convenience (a doer of chores) or a sex object. Of course I'm everything in my dream, so neither have I! At first I am too preoccupied by the busyness of contemporary life to pay much attention, but the dream tells me that this should be a priority. I need to care for the vulnerable (young child) part of myself, my inner femininity, and the first step will be to stand up to my own faulty conceptions of masculinity and femininity.

A Dangerous Illumination

The Dream: An old woman sits on a park bench with me; a younger woman sits behind us. An older child plays nearby; a baby lies in a pram with a hood the length of its carriage. The older woman speaks, sotto voce, about things the children shouldn't hear. The “nanny” behind us is alarmed that the children will hear. I look inside the tunnel created by the pram's hood and I see the baby: ugly, very ugly, its red face scrunched up in a yowl.

The older woman is murdered. The scene switches to a prequel. The older woman, the nanny, and I run into each other in a general store. They have a large stream of children with them, ranging in age from pram age to about 11. They are lined up in the order of their ages. I understand that this scene (of the dream) will help me determine who murdered the old woman.

Interpretation: This dream occurred on my mother's birthday, and the older woman in the dream allows me to reflect on her loss as I wonder: who killed her?

What is it we don't want our inner child to know, as we whisper sotto voce, if not the grim reality of our own inevitable death? Of course the baby howls—as loudly as he can—to drown out this realization. He becomes ugly from the effort. Is this what makes humans so ugly to each other? Would we behave the way we do—so grasping—if we accepted our limited time here? Death is the most basic “fact of life.” Of course it can't be discussed in front of the children who, by succeeding their parents, appear to have killed them, leaving the children with a guilt they can't acknowledge or eradicate. Or is the guilt from the unacknowledged joy of being free of them at last? Is that the murderer we can't discover?

Taxi

The Dream: I'm in a taxi with my mother. The driver is a very sweet and intelligent older man,who I assume is working beneath his station. He's very patient and chatty, friendly. I think he has this job as a way of meeting people. At some point I realize I've lost something and search frantically through my purse.

Interpretation: I'm with my mother in this dream, and the taxi driver stands in for my feeling that she worked “beneath her station.” In other words, I felt my mother never had a chance to demonstrate her many talents and abilities in the larger world. And perhaps she did “drive” her children as a compensation for her own frustrated ambition. The driver's patience, chattiness, and friendliness line up with some of her other traits: she drove us in the nicest possible way. With her death I lost her, and the sense of purpose she instilled might be the thing I am frantically searching for.

Old Vine

The Dream: I am selling my house and property. On the property is a vineyard with old growth vines, thick and gnarly, branches intricately interwoven. I tell potential buyers the vines need maintenance.

Interpretation: I am ready for a big change. I leave behind my house (my old self) and my property (the patterns of thinking and being that I've accumulated). Recognizing the complexity and interdependence of a lifetime of growth, even if some of it is convoluted (thick and gnarly), I explain to the emerging part of myself coming to the fore that some of the earlier psychic systems will need to be maintained.

Expecting in the Autumn of My Life

The Dream: An older woman is surprised to find herself pregnant. She has not seen a doctor, but she is sure this is the case: she knows how it feels.

Interpretation: These last three dreams can be looked at as a sequence that tells me I've done enough for the waking life children I have launched into the world. Now it's time for me to have a new baby (a new passion in life).

The Indignities of Old Age

The Dream: Clark and I are in LA, going to see Clark's mother. When we get to our destination it is my mother we see, not his. She is incredibly old, tiny, and practically hairless. Clark keeps trying to get her to talk—she's lying curled up on a bed—and he wants her to get dressed so we can take her out. He is being kind, but I can feel the desperation in his voice. She seems more dead than alive, but she pulls herself out of bed saying, “I get enough exercise lurching around here.” When she “walks” she is bent over at a 90 degree angle.

She goes over to a nearby toilet and sits down, with no self-consciousness whatsoever. Her dark blue trousers are at her feet as she sits on the toilet. I go over to her. She laughs. She's laughing at finding herself in this ridiculous situation: elderly, frail, sitting on a toilet in front of others. It's a short burst of cognition. I put my arms around her and say, “You're a good sport; God bless you.” Then I feel myself ready to dissolve into tears.

Interpretation: This dream, like most dreams, is trying to come to terms with life's difficulties. In this case the problem is the inevitability of aging, of watching those we love diminish, and of making the connection that as they go so will we. The animus figure Clark wants to overcome the problem with practical action—get dressed, talk, go out: in other words, carry on. The desperation in his voice tells me that even he doesn't think these measures will work. It is the aging person herself, accepting the inevitable with humor and a dignity that transcends her situation, who shows the way.

Old-Time Religion

The Dream: I’m in a city, wandering the streets. I start from a school. There are many churches: each street seems to have one, old, beautiful and out of date. It is nighttime, and I go into one.

Interpretation: Nighttime; the time of dreams and spirit. I leave the learning of the day (school) and enter the spirit realm.

Dancing with Baryshnikov

The night before having this dream I asked my dream generator to give me the dream I need, and this is what I got.

The Dream: He isn’t doing his famous leaps or anything outstanding. It is more a sort of walking, a dancer sort of walking, where the trick is not to look like a dancer. At first I’m disappointed; I want drama. I want to see the impossible. “This looks so natural,” I think.

Baryshnikov chooses me as a partner. My job is to anchor him. I stand in the center as he dances around me, holding my hand. I use my arm muscles to steady him and, while it takes some effort on my part, I think he is being careful not to tax my strength. I could handle more force, I think. I could do more.

Interpretation: In the dream, my first reaction is disappointment in the dancer’s (my inner artist’s) performance. I’m an on-looker at this point, wanting to see the leaps of “White Nights” or “Turning Point.” Is he getting old? I wonder. (Am I?) Then I come to see his natural-appearing movement as the artistry it is: the confidence to appear to be doing nothing—but just try it!

When I “help” he is considerate, but I realize I could do more: as could he! I’m left wondering what’s the right amount of effort, the right amount of display? What’s the relationship between effort and performance? Is my dream telling me to simplify? In other words, not to push it?
 

Living In Hampshire

The Dream: Clark and I own the rural and idyllic house we lived in when we were in England. I want to go back and stay for a long visit.  I wonder if I will be able to get groceries and whatever I need without having a car.  I think perhaps I can get some help from my neighbor, but then I remember she is probably elderly by now. I am also concerned with the fallout from the volcano. Is it affecting the country?

Interpretation: Dreams are almost always triggered by current events, including both those in our individual lives and those in the news. This one combines a conversation I had with my daughter about the ways Jamie Oliver has changed the British school lunch menu and the news—current at the time of this dream—of the powerful Icelandic volcano. The unconscious put these together with fond memories of four years in Hampshire and presented me with an idyllic home there. But the home is not without its dangers: I might not be able to get what I need (groceries) and an explosive force hovers. Looking at waking life, the difficult and demented aunt Clark and I are caring for might explode at any moment, and the ravages time has chiseled into her aged face make me aware of the precariousness of any sort of apparent stability. The neighbor who cannot help reflects the isolation we feel in dealing with this difficult situation.

No Compensation

An elderly relative, Aunt Peggy, has dementia and must go to a nursing home.  Making the arrangements and clearing out her house was left to my husband Clark and me. I had this dream in the middle of that difficult chore.

The Dream: Aunt Peggy’s house is almost empty, but not quite. There are a few pieces of paper lying about and one piece of furniture, a bed. As I stand near it, a cat rubs against my legs. I wonder how it got in, and if it is making the room smelly. I want Aunt Peggy’s washer and dryer, both so new they are still in their boxes. I think that having these will make up for all the disruption she has caused.

Aunt Peggy appears. She has been pronounced cured and let out of the care facility. She has decided to hook up her new washer and dryer. She and some installers unbox the pieces and work on hooking up the water. I wonder what she must think about her house having been cleared out. She seems rational and capable.

Falling Apart

The Dream: An elderly lady is failing. She is very beautiful and still sought after as a sage and speaker. She is lying on a bed, her hair coiffed and looking quite the grande dame. She is giving a lecture. A man comes over. I whisper in his ear: “Can’t we move her to a better spot, the like podium across the hall?” The lady overhears me and starts to fail before my eyes. Clearly my suggestion, while well-meant, is too much for her. She can’t make the move to a more public forum.

Interpretation: The last dream gave me a warning about too much self analysis. This dream suggests the dangers inherent in publicizing my dreams.  A beautiful and wise part of me is very fragile; it must remain private if it is to survive.

A Regal Grandmother

The Dream: I see my grandmother, who died on Christmas eve in 1978. She is wearing a large black hat. I am surprised that her skin is very smooth, without wrinkles, even though she is clearly elderly. She speaks English perfectly, which was not the case in waking life. I go up to her, surprised and pleased to see her and say, “Do you remember me? I’m Carla.” She has the quiet authority and self-assurance of a queen. “I know who you are,” she says. 

Interpretation: Grandmother’s large black hat tips us off that this dream is about mourning. Her skin has changed—no longer is it wrinkled—suggesting the rebirth metaphor of the snake which sheds its old skin. She speaks fluent English. The dream tells me that now that I am older myself I can understand her, and see her for who she really is: someone regal in spirit, someone who rose above the humble circumstances of her life. Her statement to me “I know who you are” seems to say two things at once. On the one hand, it suggests a sort of intimacy; on the other, a distance. After all, in this world we can only get so close to a spirit—and no closer.

The Old Man and the Sea

The Dream: On a cliff overlooking the sea an old man, who doesn’t walk well, is trying to catch a young girl of about seven. It looks as if he will: she is running in his direction, and he’s ready to catch her, running toward her in his wobbly way. All at once she veers inland. Happily, without a care in the world--running for the pure joy of it--she evades him completely.

Interpretation: Old age and infirmity is out to get me. I manage to elude it, at least for the time being.