Nox

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I don't believe dreams mean anything - except in the general way they reflect your attitudes and life experiences. They're just a grab bag of half formed ideas and feelings floating around in your memory, loosely tied into a sequence of events.

A kind of screensaver for when your operating system is in standby mode. Put it another way. Dreams can have significance, but not signification.

In the dream I was in some sort of institution, with Dickensian architecture but modern (though underfunded) facilities - it provided care for children who'd been abandoned or abused. I didn't work there and I wasn't a child but everyone who worked there knew me.

There were two young children, both boys, age about 9 to 11. I somehow took to caring for them - essentially babysitting. But it was night time, and the rooms, stairs and corridors of the institution were dark, so I couldn't seem them very well.

And because I couldn't see them, I couldn't be sure they really were human children. I spoke with them and we conversed, I did what I could to make them safe and comfortable. I carried them around from room to room, even carrying one to the top floor for a medical checkup. The doctors there knew me and greeted me as they went about their rounds, appreciating that I'd taken the trouble.

But in the dim light and silhouette, one of the boys looked like...it looked like I was carrying around a stack of old, heavily bound books. And the other...looked like he might be a small hairy animal, possibly a dog, or a chimpanzee.

They both spoke like children, and that's how I treated them. I loved them, and cried when I thought we might be separated and maybe they come to harm. I was always carrying one in one arm, and holding the hand of the other as we walked - sometimes swapping. We hugged closely as we moved around the rooms and stairs.

I'm not sure whether they had names, but the emotional connection was intense - full of concern and, well, love.

Then daylight came, and I could see clearly. Both were what I'd thought and hoped - normal, healthy, happy children. The 'dog' boy was absorbed playing alone on a pile of beanbags. The 'books' boy was chatting and relaxed with three friends his own age. I spoke with him, but it was now awkward, because the night had passed and he didn't need my help anymore.

They didn't want to hug, or be carried around, or even talk. They had no trouble letting go of their dependence on me, and though I was relieved that I could now see they really were what I wasn't sure I'd been taking care of...I didn't want to let go of them.

And that's when I woke up.

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No, dreams don't mean anything. And to prove it, when I went back to sleep, trying to continue the dream, I was now an invisible observer, watching a frustrated investigation into some kind of bureaucratic coverup which involved 'losing' the boy's records.

Oh, and the investigator was...Captain Jean Luc Picard. Bald, starfleet suited, and with a nice line in righteous speeches. The bureaucracy offices were all futuristic rounded white cubes and the data storage computer looked like a giant metal cactus.

I'm quite sure none of that meant anything.

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