The Dream: I’m in a car with some other people. At times I’m driving, at other times Clark. We come to an area surrounded by a wall covered with many beautiful flowers. The road is wooded and dense with vegetation, not like a forest, but like a suburban area that has been long established and become overgrown, yet beautiful. I ask what the wall surrounds, since something about the place seems familiar to me. I am told it’s a swimming pool; in fact it is the community pool near the house I lived in as a child. I am excited, saying, “I thought it looked familiar. I spent many hours here as a child.” There are wide concrete steps, set at angles, going down from the pool to street level. The path meanders. I see it’s changed a lot. At some deep level I feel “activated,” but don’t stay to explore. I don’t go into the enclosed pool area.
Interpretation: The walled-off area and the pool represent the potential I had as a child, at the time of life when it seems all things are possible. But I am now like the suburban area, long established (overgrown) and changed from what I once was. The steps taking me down to reality (street level) are concrete, like the time that has past. Despite their concreteness, these steps meander. My path in life has meandered, and I can’t undo the (concrete) choices I’ve made. Although the past can’t be changed, the way I perceive it has changed a lot. This subliminal realization is in some way exciting, but I don’t choose to explore it.