After reading the beginning of my first lesson last night, I performed my first relaxation ritual and was asked to keep two journals. One of which is a dream diary. I jotted down notes of last night's dreams on paper next to my bed as I awoke from them, and will eventually transfer them to a more substantial book that I will buy later.
I have meant to keep a dream journal for some time, but as with most things, I didn't get around to it. Dreams have been important to me over the years, so it could prove useful.
When I lived in South London as a child and teen, I grew up
across the road from one of my mother's friends, Sue. She was a quiet and reserved woman who was pretty sharp, and with striking red hair,
was petite and attractive. Think
Priscilla Presley. When I was ill, I would sometimes spend the morning there with her while Mum was at work and I was also friends with her daughters. Even though she was always generous and fair, there was a barrier around her, which made her difficult for people to get to know. I think my mother was one of the only people who had been able to get past it.
When we moved away, we heard from Sue less and less. Her and my mother's fortnightly phone conversations slipped to monthly catch-ups, and pretty soon, they began to speak every couple of months instead. As time went on, Sue contacted sporadically. We might hear from her a few times in a year or it might take two years for her to get in touch. As she became more distant in our lives, she started to become more prominent in my dreams. It started with my dreaming about her four nights in a row. On the fifth, after a very long period of no contact, she called to tell my mum that she had just been diagnosed with Cancer.
From then on, whenever I dreamt of her, she would call the next day. It became a bit of a joke here. If I had dreamt of her the night before, when the phone went, I'd say 'It's Sue', and it always was.
On one particular evening, when my mum went upstairs to take the call, my dad remarked 'Go on then .. tell me what you dreamt'. So I told him about my dream. In it, Sue was standing in a
cemetery. It was dark and there was iron railings around her. She had been crying and was upset, and somewhere in the background was her
soon-to-be ex-husband. As well as him, there was a brassy blond woman, and none of them were saying anything. Sue seemed very alone.
When my mother returned from taking the call, my dad cockily asked her '
C'mon then .. how's Sue?'. My mother told us that she was fine ... aside from the fact that she had just come back from a funeral. She went on to tell us that Sue's brother-
in-law had died. She had wanted to pay her respects but had not wanted to bump into her husband. Of course, this was inevitable, but she had not expected him to be with a new girlfriend - a woman who she described as being highly made-up and with overly beached hair. She said that she had found the experience unsettling and upsetting. My dad's jaw just dropped and from then on, he began to listen to what I had to say, regarding my dreams.
As fascinating as this kind of thing has been for me, I feel as though there is little I can do with my dreams, since they don't always make sense at the time. Another dream I had revolved around the daughter of another of my mum's friends, called Julia. I had dreamt that she was in some kind of extreme distress, and as someone who I saw as little as Sue, it seemed strange [but also important] that she would be in my dreams. When I awoke, I told my mum about it over breakfast. We discussed whether it would be worth calling her friend and telling her, but due to how daft it might sound, we resisted. It was that day that the London suicide bombers eventually struck in 2005.
Julia had had to take a different route to work than usual on the 5
th July 2
oo5 and had needed to take a bus. Not used to this, she hadn't realised that you have to buy a ticket prior to your journey in London and cannot pay with cash. On getting onto a bus, the driver refused her money and told her to go and find a ticket machine. She had argued about it a bit, but in defeat, got off of the bus and walked off to purchase a ticket. As she had walked a short way from the vehicle, the fourth and last of the day's devices exploded on that very bus. Julia was not hurt, but many did lose their lives and she was in deep shock afterwards.
I am hoping that keeping a dream journal will help locate patterns between what I dream and what materialises in the world. So much so that I can intervene between my prophecies and incidents such as in my example. Consistency might help me trust the messages. I remember awaking and telling my ex-boyfriend, 'I just
dreamt that Princess Diana is dead'. At the time, a couple of months before she actually did die, it seemed the most ridiculous thing to say.
For today, I have drawn the
3 of Cups. The lads and their tankards are back, and this time, I think I know why. It is a beautifully sunny day, and once my boyfriend has woken up [he is laying asleep next to me], we are going into town to get a card and present for his sister's birthday. Being the weekend, he enjoys a couple of drinks to relax. Because he will have to drive me back home tomorrow evening, he won't be able to drink at his sister's party, so we will have a couple in the sun this afternoon. The card is about appreciating the day, celebrating what we have got, and getting together with friends. However, on a darker note, it warns of excess.
Illustration from The DruidCraft Tarot by Will Worthington
I am a few weeks into the Shadowscapes Tarot, and with each turned card, my breath is still taken away by it's beauty and depth. I don't think I have owned a deck where I have liked every single card, but each of the seventy-eight in this one sparkle so beautifully. Since I bought it, I have seen it's reflection in the world around me. I have noticed more swans on the river than before and have seen them acknowledged in paintings and sculptures on my travels. Similarly, I cant tell you how many owls I have seen in shops lately - crafted out of wood, brass, china, or clay. They are everywhere. The deck heightens my sensitivity to nature and the natural world around me.
