A Remodel

The Dream: I am remodeling my very large apartment in the city. One room looks quite spectacular. It is the dining room. A large wooden table sits in its center. The walls are covered in a velvet-like pattern, a simplified medieval design in rich shades of green and golden brown with black accents. Brown wood molding surrounds the windows. I think it looks wonderful, but I am concerned this decoration has been slapped on to a base that can’t support it. On the other hand,  perhaps it really is okay.

Interpretation: This dream seems to be a continuation of Not A Black Hole. My psyche is attempting to shift its center; in other words, the Self that Jung talks about is trying to expand in order to include some previously unconscious material. The dining room, being a place where we come together for nourishment, symbolizes this process. But at the center of the room is the large wooden (not pliable, rigid) table (in a meeting to table the motion stops forward progress). I can see there is richness here: the velvet, the warm colors—but I’m not sure I’m strong enough to support it. The jury is still out on this one.

The Sink

The Dream: There’s a bathroom I want to remodel. It’s in my house, but situated in the same place as the bathroom in my childhood home. I want to redo the tile, and I notice the sink might need to be replaced. Once I focus my attention on it, I see that it is very tiny and has been moved forward from the place where a more traditional sink once stood. There is a mark on the wall that indicates its original placement; the paint has peeled away, exposing an earlier color.

The tiny new sink is in the center of the room and functions more as a planter than a sink. It is decorative, filled with foliage. I think it is far too small for any practical function, and I suspect that the previous owners have installed it as a “quick fix” to make the bathroom more appealing to buyers.

Interpretation: I’m in a private place, a bathroom, which tells me that I’m dealing with a personal, private issue that I’d like to change. (I want to remodel.) Yet the attempt gives me a sinking feeling.  Although the current sink (problem) is small, it has left its mark (the traces of the original) and moved away from the wall (block) to a central spot in the room (my psyche). The new growth arising in this unlikely place (the foliage) hints that the problem is unraveling, much as the ferns do. That the growth is associated with water (the sink again) suggests it is taking place at an unconscious level.

But, as usual with dreams—they both giveth and taketh away with their paradoxical implications. The growth is taking place in a very tiny new sink: it’s a small start, nothing to get too excited about. It might even be superficial: a quick fix that will satisfy the buyers (the parts of my psyche that really don’t want to be bothered).