The last two nights, I have had two unrelated dreams that both relate to home. I use the term home liberally because the dreams relate to three different homes: my present home in Madrid, my family’s home in Maryland and the first house I had lived in in Maryland from the ages of 2 to 8. What is always interesting about dreams is their ability to make possible physical impossibilities.
On Tuesday night, I dreamt that I was about to travel from Madrid to Washington, DC (to my family’s home in Maryland). That’s not so strange, now is it? Wait. I was waiting for a bus to take me to the airport. But, the bus stop wasn’t located in Madrid. It was located on the corner of Great Arbor Drive and Bells Mill Rd. in Maryland, near to the house I had lived in from 2 to 8 (see Map above). My family’s present home is only a five minute drive from there. The bus was to take me to Barajas Airport, and I would then fly from Madrid to Washington, DC (i.e., Maryand).
When the bus was about to leave, I remembered that I had forgotten my iPod. I asked the bus driver if he could wait for me for 5 minutes while I ran home to get it. In my dream, my iPod was located at my family’s old home. The house was close by, but not that close (on Timber Hill Lane as seen in the map above). It has crossed my mind that it would probably take me a little longer to reach the house, but I set out anyways. Right as I left to go get the iPod, I woke up.
In my dream last night, a friend of mine from Spain was coming with me on my trip home to visit my family. Instead of taking place at my family’s present home, everything took place at the old house. Some of the things took place in rooms that I had completely forgotten even existed.
I thought it was kind of strange that I should have two consecutive dreams relating to my family’s old house. I almost never think about it. My mother always says how much she loved that house. I particularly like the woods in the neighborhood with a winding creak. Maybe having dreamt one night about it and then having remembered the dream, made me dream about something similar the next night. Who knows.
To be honest, I haven’t really analzyed in depth the meaning of these dreams. I suppose it has something to do with my thinking about distance and about exactly what dates I will travel home this summer.
Dreams, even the strange ones, are pretty useful. I got to go back to my old house and remember some things I had forgotten without even leaving my bed in Madrid. It might have only been in my dreams, but I do in fact now remember little things from the past. If I could only dream about math and be able to do my taxes or save the world from a bomb threat in French.
Grave Error 
Eric – I enjoy dreaming and invite myself to do so every night, enhancing the chances by sleeping on my back. The most fascinating thing to me is that most of them take me to places I don’t recall ever being to. In the early moments after waking up, I enjoy thinking about the vivid detail of the places, and wonder how my mind could conjure them up (in another life perhaps?). One of the most frequent none travel dreams has me playing soccer. Another, that almost everyone seems to have, has me a week a away from exams, not having ever attended three or four of my classes. My dreams rarely involve me being in home territory or with people I’m acquainted with in this life. Charlie
Very interesting about having dreams far away from where you presently live or have been… whereas mine seem to take me way back.
Sometimes I dream that I am at a soccer match and a player gets injured and the coach asks me to come on. I always try to explain to the coach that I haven’t “trained” in almost 20 years. Sometimes I actually play alright, so it isn’t a problem.