Dinner and Dancing - what does it mean?

[moonlily]

To give some background information on all parties of the dream, I’ll start with a few quick descriptions. When I was much younger, my best friend was a boy, let's call him M, who I was in school with. He and I were pretty much inseparable, and we always hung out during and outside of school. We drifted apart after a friend of his asked me if I would go out with M, and I didn’t respond. In the past few years, I’d come to be in a nearly identical situation with another guy, V. In retrospect, he and M have many similarities. A difference, though, is that I did eventually date V, in the past year, though it was short lived. The real reason for our brake up is still sort of a mystery to me, though one excuse was that he cared too much and was afraid to hurt me. I saw him again recently, though, and things are very awkward between us, I hardly speak or even make eye contact with him anymore. I still have feeling for V, which makes the situation even more difficult. I had this dream last night, and it has been troubling me. Any ideas? The dreams starts that I am with my very good friend and her family, at a fairly upscale restaurant. We walk in and a waitress beckons for us to follow her, so we begin to walk. I am easily distracted, though, so I begin to look about, and when I turn around I realize I am no longer following my friend, but one of her family members. I continue to follow said family member, until we get to a table and, not paying attention, I sit. I only look up when I hear a little cough, and realize I had been following the wrong person, and sat down with another family. Coincidentally, it was my friend M and his family, who I hadn’t seen in years. I smile and say hello though I am extremely embarrassed, and quickly excuse myself. They nod and laugh, saying it was good to see me and that it was no problem at all, actually a delight. M hasn’t said anything, though, but when I get up he follows me. Instead of finding the correct table with my other friend, I walk around the restaurant with M and chat for a while. It then jumps to another time, where I am inside my house and what seems to be a sort of party is going on. There’s an unknown man in a suit, with a very proper appearance and manner, who tells everyone attending that we must dance for a certain period of time, I believe it was supposed to be twenty minutes. Very dramatic music begins to play, and I am partnered with M. I look over my shoulder and see V, and know that though I am dancing with M I am attempting to impress V, who I’d said hello to earlier. We begin to dance and my movement gets more and more dramatic, until I am spinning and twisting and cannot seem to stop. I am no longer holding M’s hand, but am holding an orchid bloom, staring down at it as I twirl. Eventually I realize I am really out of control, and I feel incredibly ill and feverish, and I topple over. I know I have not completed the set amount of time, and know that if someone realizes that I’ll be punished, but I cannot continue to dance. I stumble to my room and lie down on my bed, feeling very sweaty and sick. I can hear my heart beat drumming in my ears and am astounded by the force, speed, and volume of the beats. Soon the time allotment is complete and everyone else stops dancing. M had been looking for me and finds me on my bed. He walks over and tenderly brushes the sweaty hair from my brow, his other hand resting on my arm. The proper man mentioned earlier then arrives at my bedside, and begins angrily accusing me of never beginning to dance. I tell him I danced for the whole time, even though I probably missed about five minutes at the end. He says he doesn’t believe me and that there is no way to prove it. I do have a way to prove it though – my still furious heartbeat. I tell the man that he can feel my pulse, and then he will know that I was dancing. He places his fingers on my wrist and tries desperately to find a pulse, but cannot. He repeats this with a vein on my neck, and with my chest, but still cannot seem to find the pulse. I feel my heartbeat dwindling slightly, and begin to be afraid that it will become normal again before he has the time to find it. It is then that I see V in the doorway, holding a stethoscope. Nobody else has noticed him, as he is standing in the shadows, but he leans forward and quickly places the stethoscope on my desk, before retreating back into the shadowed area of the doorway. The suited man begins to say that it is impossible, that I am dead, and do not have a heart at all. I point to the stethoscope, and tell him to use that to listen to my heartbeat. He grabs it quickly, placing the end on my chest, and a look of surprise and relief comes upon his face. He says that he can hear my heartbeat and it is fast enough that I must have been dancing. He also keeps mumbling about how curious it is that he couldn’t hear or feel it before. He nods, placing the stethoscope on my night table, and then walks away. As he steps through the door, V moves aside for him to pass, and I notice that V has been staring at me, worriedly, this whole time. M begins to stroke my hair and kisses my forehead, noting that I’m still feverish. His hand cups my cheek and he is rubbing circles on it with his thumb. V notices, looks crestfallen, and finally leaves the doorway, walking away. Then, I woke. In the dream, I realize that M wants to be with me, cares for me, and is devoted to me, but nonetheless I want to be with V instead.

[Burned up]

I guess this was a very moving dream for you and I suspect the emotions stayed for a considerable waking time afterwards. This seems to be a feature of dreams about people we feel innocently close to, and where in the dream we become more intimate still. I believe you have a yearning for a lost part of you, which in hindsight you realised was found at least in part when you were with M and V. I suspect we're refering here to the part of you that relates to or manifests as maleness. In real life you've found it hard to stay in touch with that part of you, because social factors got in the way. There's so much in the dream that it would make a case study in its own right. The suited man sounds like it's a part of you that wants to exert control. He says you "have no heart" - could this be refering to your ultimate failure to follow your heart when you were with M and V in real life? You spend a lot of dream time proving to him that indeed you do have a heart. Is this an inner conflict of yours coming through? The numbers may also give clues. 20 minutes could translate as 20 years. And 15 minutes for 15 years. Don't know if these times are meaningful to you? Or the numbers could have another meaning to you. I couldn't get the drift of the difference between M and V. You had subtly different feelings for them in your dream, and these represent two parts of you. How are they different? Bu