Thread: I need help with this one... put on your reading glasses!

I had a vivid dream last night (night of 9/11) that left me startled and unsettled, though I don't think it was really a nightmare. I appreciate your insight/interpretation as I try to figure out why these images came to me.

Let's start with the dream:

The first thing I remember is being driven around a strange hill by a group of people I didn't know on a sunny day, when lots of people were out doing various things around it. The people in the car pointed out a family of three (father, mother, daughter) that were standing nearby, and they waved and smiled as we passed. We drove further, and the father reappeared by himself: he was completely nude, his back facing us, and was shoveling, or somehow working on the soil.

The next scene I recall is being in a large, municipal indoor pool area with plenty of windows and sunshine streaming in; I believe I was surrounded by friends. For some reason I was feeling overwhelmingly frustrated, and started acting out childishly, ultimately throwing myself into the deep-end of the pool to drown myself. I waited at the bottom for someone to come fetch me out, grew impatient, and swam back to the surface. After getting out of the water, I was prepared to curse out my friends for not rescuing me. I distinctly remember being told I was under water for 9 minutes. My friends alerted me to a fire that had just combusted beyond a nearby staircase. I saw a fire extinguisher in the staircase hallway below the flashes of the flames; and as I ran and went to reach for it, a gorgeous, blond, nude young guy descended the stairs, throws me an angry, disgusted glance, grabs the extinguisher, and runs upstairs with it. I become enraged, somehow find a second extinguisher, and think to myself (say aloud?) "If you won't let me take my life, I'll take all of yours with mine..." I engage the extinguisher and blow it out onto the pool water. I get an incredibly pungent, bitter taste in my mouth, and the scene ends. (Note: I just did some googling, and it seems like chlorine reacts dangerously with the chemicals in fire extinguishers - I DIDN'T KNOW THIS WHEN I DREAMED IT!!!)

The last part is spooky. I'm suddenly in my childhood home, standing in our piano room/living room, and my late cat (gone for at least 10 yrs) is flying around in the air violently and aimlessly, looking as if an invisible force is holding her under her front legs. I grab her for a moment, but she's pulled back away. I ask her "What's happening? What are you doing?" and she replies, "There are people all around - why can't you see them?!" And with that I wake up.

And now a little explanation/interpretation of my own:

I'm a young gay guy in a long, committed relationship with my partner (7 yrs). In recent years, he's been suffering some serious anxiety issues, and had to seek medical treatment, which made him put on weight and decreased his libido to pretty much null. To keep things civil and happy between us, I've had to turn to other ways of *ahem* innocently releasing tension, which may explain the naked men in my dream. There is a sense of shame associated with this situation, as in the past my bf's considered it a form of infidelity, and it's become this ugly personal secret (until this post...). I think this relates to the drowning, immature behavior/tantrums, fire, and poisoning in my dream. I consider myself to be a patient, tolerant person. I love my bf, my friends, and my family. I've never had suicidal or homicidal thoughts, but I knew it was me in the dream saying and thinking these things. Thoughts?

The part of our house I visit at the end is one where I've often felt unseen presences. We have old photos up there of family members who lived and died before I was born; the house itself is from the Victorian era. At one point we had 4 cats, and they all chose that part of the house ultimately as their final resting place. The cat in my dream was our oldest, and lived with me the longest. After she passed, she began visiting me in dreams, mostly casually just watching over me, and sometimes talking to me. Sometimes I become frightened by her apparition; she doesn't react well to that, usually making things fly around, or creating gusts of wind, like a hurricane. I don't know what this is all about!