last night's dream... snakes and miniature submarines

I've been having snakes appear in my dreams now and then, seemingly on a frequent basis. Last night's dream was strange and stuck with me, making me wonder if there was some sort of interpretative significance. It wasn't a long dream and went like this:

I was in my house but not in my neighborhood. In fact, I didn't know it was my house until the end of the dream. I was outside on the front steps and it was nighttime. There was a porch light illuminating the nearby area and a small bush to my left. Directly past the bush was a neighbor's house. I never saw or acknowledged the neighbor, just that there was a doorway to my left that went to the house right next door, almost like a duplex (I live in a house though).

Strangely, there was a moat of sorts or maybe just a stream going a long the front of the houses/duplexes but it didnt curve around them as a moat does, just came towards the house from the right side, ran in front of the house a bit, and then curved away from the house on the left. I remember while fluorescent light not too far off to the left of where I was, and seeing the reflection on the stream that was moving slowly. The stream flowed from the right to left (upstream from the house was to the right, downstream to the left).

So that sets the scene. What happened was this: I was standing on the porch of my place and I remember feeling that someone was being sabotaged of downstream from where I was. I dont know who it was and couldn't see them but they were being unknowingly assaulted by an unseen foe who was upstream from the house. The "assault" was coming in the form of miniature remote controlled submarines that floated along on the surface of the stream. I remember diving down towards the bush that was between my door and whoever lived next to me, to grab rocks or sticks or something to throw at the subs. The house next door had a red look to it, either it was painted a dark red or there were red lights in it.

I remember that i couldnt find anything to throw so i ran over and started picking up the subs and knew to tear the bottoms off of them to expose explosive material--which i took and threw into the water. It exploded when I threw it but not anything major, just like a firecracker or something. I distinctly remember one handful of material was like small black oval shaped pouch-like things that i threw.

Right after that, I felt that I was successful in preventing the assault so I went into my house. In spite of the outside being totally different that what my house really is, the inside looked like my living room except the Christmas tree was still up. As I looked at the tree while walking in, I saw a black snake with faint greenish stripes on it wrapped in the tree around a limb. It's head was not diamond shaped so it was non-poisonous (as poisonous snakes around where I live usually have a distinct diamond shaped head). I remember telling myself it was a garter snake even though it really didnt look like one. I saw the head clearly though. I went to get something to remove the snake with when suddenly I saw a nasty looking long grayish snake with black splotches and a huge diamond shaped head wrapped partially around the trunk of the tree and the limbs. I panicked and grabbed a long walking stick that I have, swung at the snake and knocked it all out the door. The snake was really long and aggressive. It's head was gruesome looking. It reminded me of a rattlesnake but the colors werent right. I took the stick and whacked the crap out of the head. I remember seeing it stretch its head out some and open its mouth wide after I hit it. Another hit and it quivered and faded away. I remember feeling glad that got rid of it and became concerned that it could have attacked my dog (a dachshund). That's when I woke up.


I read a bit about snakes and their meaning and while there's some stuff that I could take away from the dream with what I read, I'm really thinking there's something significance about the poisonous and non-poisonous aspects of the snakes. In the past, I think the snakes have all been non-poisonous. Still, I got rid of all of them in some form or fashion. Also, my neighbor on the right side of my house has been a great guy. we have no animosity between us. his house isnt red either.

any thoughts? thanks in advance.