I
was staying at a friend's house and I was running late for work. It was
a GIANT house and I needed to shower, and I started it but then I went
to lock the bathroom door. There wasn't just one door, but several
because the bathroom was actually an insanely long corridor with the
shower stall at one end. By the time I locked all the doors to the end
and got back, my friend had turned off the shower and taken over that
end of the bathroom. I hiked back to the other end, thinking I had seen a
shower at that end as well, but when I got back down there I saw it was
a lavish outdoor pool with lots and lots of people in and around it.
All this took place while I was wrapped in a towel. At this point I was
so late I just decided to go to work dirty.
Kristine, the fact that your dream self is running late is an indication that you feel, in the grand scheme of things, you're running out of time. We're mortal beings, my friend, and time is finite. Like many people who reach middle age, you're at a crossroads, and this dream is presenting you with certain options that lay ahead of you: the one you choose will be pivotal in how the rest of your life plays out.
You've dreamt about about shame, self-loathing, and the multiple layers of protection you've built up to hide from the inescapable truth about yourself. The GIANT house in your dream represents your psyche - so vast and complicated, cavernous, really. An easy place in which to get lost....especially when one harbors a GIANT secret and GIANT shame. In the dream, you find yourself in this big house, and feel you need a shower. This is because in your waking hours, when you look too deeply into yourself, you feel unclean. What you keep hidden away behind closed, psychic doors is that which you feel is filthy and unseemly, and you wish you could wash it away. The long bathroom you describe is the length of time you've already lived: your life to-date. It's been a long road getting to where you are today, and there are multiple locks and doors at the end that long span of time from that which you find unclean: your true sexual preference, which is that of a gay woman. Just as you've spent years (and lots of energy) locking the world away from your inner lesbian, your dream self takes the long walk to lock the multiple doors behind you. The good news is, this is ultimately a dream about you confronting this crossroads with friends-of-Dorothy on hand to lead you to the promised land. Whereas you've spent a lifetime locked away from the world, what you're clearly ready to do at this stage in life is shut the door on what's behind you and take not a Karen Silkwood shower to wash away the gay, but to enjoy a dip in a luxurious pool of Sapphic delights. You're ready to take the full muff dive, Kristine. Your nudity, except for a towel, illustrates how exposed you suddenly feel, now that you've subconsciously decided to embrace your inner lesbian. Be brave and go out into the world dirty, Gay Girl. If Meryl Streep had just hit it with Cher, like she should have, Silkwood would have been a completely different movie.
