Last Night I Had a Dream

Dreams are strange things, sometimes you wake with just fragments of images from a dream, other times you remember nothing and then there are those dreams that just keep nagging at you throughout the day; images that pop into your head disrupting your thoughts and dragging you back into the full details of the dream. Perhaps it is because sometimes a dream is more than just a dream.



The other night I had one of those dreams that lingers through the day and into the next. I stood at the top of three stone steps, on the first step lay five stick figures made of straw; two large and three small. I looked up to see four Native American Elders, dressed in traditional garb. These men told me that the figures on the step were a sign that "five have gone into the dessert". The next thing I saw in this dream was my boots walking through the desert, and my hand stretching down to leave bottles of water under sage brush and cactus.



This was the entire dream. It was short and quiet, but it has been bothering me for three days now. What does it mean? Why would I dream something like this? It could be about immigration, that seems to be the simple answer; I speak out about the injustice and growing prejudice that is occuring in the fight against undocumented immigration. Building walls, or fences is not the answer. Sending undocumented immigrants back across the border is not the answer. The answer to the immigration problems is in the home country of the migrating people, and the policies of our own government that promotes the inflow of undocumented workers (but that is another blog). I don't think this particular dream is about immigration, I think it is something else.

What am I missing? Is it in the numbers; three steps, five people, four elders? Or is the key in the words; straw, water and desert? Every image and word from this dream has invaded my thoughts over the past few days. I could just accept that the dream was inspired by my concern for the many people who struggle to come to America; but that just isn't right, I know it isn't right; there is a deeper meaning to this dream that I just can't put my finger on.