What dreams may come

or many years I have considered the dreams I see as an important source of information and reflection. Given the scientific and supernatural explanations that exist with dream interpretation, I decided to blog the three most comprehensive dream sequences I saw within the last week. Now, maybe they are all indicative of the same thing – the biggest decision of my life that takes place in July – but notwithstanding their symbolic value, I still wanted to see them in black and white, for once. There have been many dreams in the past that have been more in depth with their description than these but never before have I seen so many dream fragments connected to the same person and/or event. Hence, I felt the need to blog about it. So here we go.

Sequence 1

There is a long corridor that is painted red and green. I am sitting with my mother and helping her prepare some dish. My hands are soaked in the batter using which we are making the delicacy. At this point my brother comes running in with a pile of pink colored sheets. I immediately stop helping mom and start to chase him to retrieve those pages he has with him. After a brief pursuit I finally bag the sheets that have blue colored writing all over them. Some of the sentences on them are so badly crossed out multiple times that I cannot read a word of what the original thought was. On closer inspection I realize that they are actually love letters from Jaya. I recognize her handwriting and continue reading them as everything around me begins to fade out into a white glow. I can hear my mother shouting from inside the house warning me that she will tear up the sheets if I do not return to help her. I ignore her and continue reading the contents of the letters. Most of it is now incoherent to me but the one line which I cannot forget is – ‘How can something that is cause for my pain also be the medicine too?’ The air fills up with the aroma of a thousand roses as I continue reading the letters one by one...

Sequence 2
I am in a crowded bus surrounded by every relative I have known my whole life. Aunts, uncles, cousins, nephews, nieces – everyone is there. I find myself wondering how a bus would be enough to fit all 100+ of them! I then turn around to find my aunt Indu sitting next to me and enquiring me about something. I respond something incoherent while one of my cousins comes over and tells me they need to stop for some tender coconut water as everyone is quite thirsty and tired from the journey. I look outside the window and find dark green signs all over the city we are in with something written in Tamil. I do not know the language yet I find myself telling them that there is one coconut shop right around the corner. The bus stops and we all get down one by one and start ordering the coconuts. The man who sells the coconuts seems familiar. I do not know where I have seen him before but it is only after I awoke from this dream sequence that I realized who he was. More on that later. We ask him for directions to a river nearby and he speaks in fluent Kannada and tells us that the river is about half a kilometer from where we are. I ask him how he can speak such wonderful Kannada in what seems to be a predominantly Tamil speaking place. He says something I do not recollect properly now. We get back on the bus and I go to the driver to give him directions to the river. To my surprise I find that the driver is the same person who was selling the coconut water just a few seconds ago! I ask him how it is he does two things at one time to which he says something, again, I cannot recall. We arrive at the river that seems to be at the end of a dusty lane and we get ready to cross it. Someone suddenly remembers that Kamalu ajji (my late maternal grandmother) is also with us and needs a boat to be transported across the river. I turn around to find the driver and my brother both carrying a coracle and heading towards where we stand. We put the old lady on it and set her afloat only to realize she hasn’t been given a paddle! I turn to the driver to ask him for a paddle when I realize I am the only one there. All my relatives, the driver, the coracle – everything and everyone has vanished. It was only after waking up that I realized the driver and the coconut vendor was Krishna, Jaya’s elder brother...

Sequence 3

This one was the most descriptive among the three I am narrating here. I am inside a fort like enclosure with very high walls. A giant wooden door stands in front of me through which I am trying to look at an approaching procession. There is a lot of cacophony and musical instruments that are giving the procession a regal flair. A giant elephant is carrying a small mantapa inside which seems to be seated a woman with a veil covering her face. I try my best to open the Herculean wooden door but without success. I find myself wearing ragged clothes and I am also barefoot. Weird looking insects buzz around me and mock me telling me how it is impossible for someone like me to get a glimpse of whoever is in the mantapa on the elephant. I ignore their jabs and start running along the wall to see if there is an opening somewhere so that I can get out of the fort. But no matter how fast I run (and believe me, I was running real fast!) the wall doesn’t seem to end. If anything it continues to grow taller and wider. Eventually I hear a voice booming behind me telling me that the only way I can get past the wall is if I manage to get fire in my legs. I take a deep breathe and jump as high as I can to find that indeed, sparks are flying out of my feet and my foot is blazing with a dull glow as if it were ignited. I fly past the merciless hardness of the wall and cross over it in one giant leap. On getting to the other side I realize that the procession is headed to where I was standing before – inside the giant door. A pathway is surrounded on both sides by five-foot tall grass blades. I push my way past them and approach the procession slowly. When I realize I am at an arm’s length from it I once again kick myself up to be able to fly like before and to attempt reaching the mantapa atop the elephant’s back. But to my surprise I find that the higher the leap the farther the procession gets. This means that there is just no way I can ever reach the mantapa and see who the woman behind the veil is. Those pesky insects return to mock my attempt and take jabs at my meaningless trials at getting to see the princess. I continue watching in silence as the procession passes me by in all pomp and glory...

..ShaKri..