Dream 2- The Crossing
Date: March 2010
Scene 1
There are lots of women streaming across in front of me. They are coming from the left to the right. They all have their hands tied in front of them (their wrists are at right angles to each other-in the dream this seems very important). I can’t see their faces because they are turning to cross a river. They are crossing the river by going over stepping stones.
Scene 2
There is one woman and one man on a flat area. It seems as though it is the other side of the river but all the other women have disappeared. The man is tall and dark-haired. The woman is fair-haired and small, maybe she is actually a little girl. Then it seems as though the woman is me (I am small and fair haired). The man is advancing towards me with a pair of scissors held open like shears (at the same angle as the bound wrists). Although the man’s wrists are bound he can still hold the scissors in this menacing way. The scissors glint in the light. I back away but there is something (what?) behind me that stops me getting away. The man is going to cut me. I’m very afraid. I wake up.
Memories and concerns with associations to “The Crossing”.
Scene 1
On-going concern 1
Charles and I got together later in life. We said we would “tell each other everything”. We didn’t. But, occasionally, a detail falls out of a conversation about something else. One detail plays on my mind. One of Charles’s previous partners liked to have her wrists tied during sex. Sometimes I wonder if all of his previous partners liked to have their wrists tied. I don’t ask. I don’t know if I want to know the answer. But, at the same time, I still want to know everything.
Why are the women going over stepping stones?
Remote memory 1
About two months prior to having “The Crossing” dream, I walked alongside a river with Charles, his son and his two little girls. There were stepping stones across the river but the water was so high that a sign instructed walkers not to use them. It was dangerous. Nevertheless, Charles’s son went across with his two little daughters. I was standing on the bank facing the full fast-flowing river. The stepping stones to my left. I was anxious that the girls may slip and fall into the water. They were fine. They did not fall in.
Recent memory 1
The evening before the dream the TV news reported on Ian Huntley, a dark haired UK man who had been recently convicted of murdering two little girls. Huge publicity surrounded the Ian Huntley case in the British media. He murdered one of the little girls in a bath so there is an association with water. Huntley claimed both girls died in accidents in his bathroom, that one slipped into the water in the bath and drowned. This recent memory seems to be the day-residue which triggered the dream (see the Decoding dreams page for more about day-residues)
Scene 2
Recent memory 1
The TV news on the evening before the dream reported that another prisoner had attacked Huntley, cutting his throat with a “home-made” blade.
Remote memory 2/On-going concern 2
My clothes were home-made when I was a little girl. My mother cut the fabric out with scissors. She warned me that scissors are dangerous so I shouldn’t touch or play with them. Even now, I can’t bear to see scissors left around with the blades open. My scissors have a safety shield to keep the blades closed.
Very remote memory/On-going concern 3
In the dream, it seems very significant that the tied wrists are crossed at right angles and the scissors are at exactly the same angle i.e with their blades open. The word ‘cross’ is associated with ‘crossing’ the river and my mother said that scissors with their blades open are very dangerous but this doesn’t seem to fully explain why the angle of the scissors seems so significant.
I think this may be associated with an old fear. When I was a little girl, my mother told me that my father had threatened to strangle her. He put his hands around her throat and said, “Don’t leave me”. My mother was in bed so she couldn’t get away. As a child, I buried this memory, although I was always wary when my father was around. As an adult, I sometimes visualized my father’s hands coming together at his wrists to grasp my mother’s neck. I think it may be this image, which is associated with the tied wrists and the angle of the scissors. But why would this have been a threat to me? My mother was pregnant with me at the time. She was thinking of leaving my father because she was in love with someone else.
What does “The Crossing” mean? What does it reveal about me?
In Scene 1, I see many women crossing the river before me. I think this before me may be metaphorical (see the Decoding dreams page for more explanation about metaphors). In my waking life I wonder about the women who went before me with Charles, did they all have their wrists tied during sex? The dream seems to mean that I think they did. Also in the dream I can’t see the women’s faces. In my waking life I have never met any of Charles’s previous partners. Not seeing the women in the dream seems to reflect this.
The tall, dark haired man with the threatening scissors In Scene 2 seems to be many men simultaneously, in other words he is a hybrid (see the Decoding dreams page for explanations of hybrids). First, he is the prisoner who attacked Ian Huntley and slashed his throat but in the dream it’s a small fair haired woman/girl who is attacked. Second, he is Ian Huntley because he attacked and killed little girls. Third, he is my father because he threatened to strangle my mother when she was pregnant with me, when I was an unborn “very little girl”. Four, he is Charles, who has never threatened me, but hearing about the tied wrists during sex has left me with the idea that there could be a threat. What does this reveal about me? The dreams says, for me, men are a threat but not always. The dream seems to indicate that the threat is to little girls. Also I’m not conscious of this fear in my waking life. The dream also portrays helplessness. All the women who cross on the stepping stones have their hands tied. Prisoners have their hands tied. My mother couldn’t get away because she was in bed. In the dream I can’t get away because there is something (what?) behind me.