The first one was like this TC Boyle story I was reading, but then I was also a character in the story but, at the same time could hear the text being narrated above me. In the dream, I was in Sonora. Now, I've never been to Sonora, so I have no idea what it looks like, but in my imagination it was some kind of tundra with hills, the badlands of spaghetti westerns. I was shadowing these three vaqueros--hey, were they the three caballeros? Anyway, I remember watching them from a hill as it got darker; seeing them ride by on mules and stop and set up camp. Then I fell asleep in the darkness of my perch, but for some reason, I was afraid they would find me, and I would be in trouble. I'm not sure why; it was just that B movie mentality, I guess: Somthin' bad gonna happen. So then I sneaked down into the valley below, on the other side of the mountain from the vaqueros, and into this cabin. In the cabin is a young David Bowie in his glam rock days--all dolled up. He is dancing and putting his hand on the mirrored door to a closet, and his reflection alternates between being Nicole Kidman, Tina Turner, and--oh yeah--Jane Fonda. Then the dream switches to first person, and I see myself in Bowie's reflection. But I am also hiding in the other room, trying not to be seen by Bowie and his entourage on the other side of the looking glass. Then I go back onto the hill and I can hear the TC Boyle narration above me, or maybe it is in dialogue. One vaquero says, cuidado de la culebra, meaning the rattlesnake that slithers by them. Another says, I am the salt of the earth. I am the sap of a stone. And I am poor as dirt. This rattlesnake is the best thing that ever happened to me. The third vaquero or the narration says, pues, ay solamente una cosa a hacer; then there is only one thing to do. And that was supposed to be the end of the story and end of the dream, but I understood by that brief, Hemingwayesque exchange that they meant to kill and eat the snake.

That was the first dream, and I woke up and repeated it in my mind but didn't write anything down. Now that I've analyzed it, I think it is about dualism, particularly between the anima, or female side of my psyche, and the animus, or male side. Behind me was the fop David Bowie and his pop icon beauty queens, and in front of me were these three, silent-type macho men who eat snakes. It was interesting, though, that I was hiding from both of them and fearing discovery from either party.

The second was like a PBS documentary of something called the Mensai Indians. Upon waking, I realized it was pronounced like "men sigh". It was all happening on some island in the Gulf of Mexico, but the elderly couple featured in the documentary were like stereotypical, generic, mainland North American Indians, like you would see in an anti-pollution public service announcement or a plea for legislation in favor of tribal casinos. The man had shoulder length hair and a solid blue flannel western shirt, with mother-of-pearl snap buttons on the pockets. The woman had on a long blue skirt. They both were dressed entirely in blue, which now I think is important. In the documentary, they were trying to save their home from an oncoming hurricane. They finally get to this sort of beach house/hotel and try to get in the basement, but cannot. The man takes the green garden house (much like the snake of the previous dream) and shoots it into the air, which is supposed to be a sign of surrender to the hurricane god or something, a plea, like, come and take us. The beads from the hose form a kind of firmament of their own, an umbrella of droplets like falling stars. The woman joins him under the umbrella and they await their demise. He or I imagine that the hurricane will take the water as an offering into its own pregnant clouds and suck the couple up as well into the heavens. But the hurricane, swirling in shades of blue and mingling the line betwixt sky and sea, blows out to the west and leaves them be. Then I am holding the hose and it turns into an actual, giant umbrella. I can change the pitch of the sound it makes by moving the folding mechanism up and down, much like changing the pressure of water on a hose by holding one's thumb over the nozzle. I play the melody to a that Count Basie tune, April in Paris, on the hose-turned-umbrella. Around my circumference is a giant, uninflated plastic circle. This is much like the kiddie pool I might have played in as a child, only much larger. I am shooting the water up into the air and watching the beads fall like rain, like crystalline, translucent stars. Then Amy comes home, but it is a different house, and I tell her about my day, including the other dream I had, for I dream that I'm awake. It must be the future because she has a job as well as it being a different house from where we are now. She is tired and uninterested, and I make her toast in the toaster oven.

OK, analysis: I say rebirth through the fear of death, if not the actual death. Water is always rebirth. We have the eternal circle in the umbrella of water and the giant kiddie pool. We have the womb imagery with the circles and the water as well. The other dream had the snake, which shreds its skin, and is a symbol of death and rebirth. The snake is going to die by being eaten. It is itself the eternal circle, the snake devouring its own tail. It is threatening to the vaqueros, but also the best thing that ever happened to them--a blessing in disguise. Lastly, there is perfect duality in that there were two dreams, connected to each other by my remembrance of the previous dream in the first.