Recurring dreams of home. But not home. But, home.

I’ve been staring at the TV for about 15 minutes while one gunfire scene has been playing. How do they not run out of bullets? I swear, there is some dumb shit out there and tonight it’s on my TV. My back hurts because I’ve been leaning over a lot today, and it’s only 8:30 but I’m already really looking forward to going to sleep tonight… mostly because of that house. You know the one—the dream house that’s actually your old house, but the architecture was designed by someone on a drug-fueled bender who really liked extra hallways.

This morning I slept through my alarm. I woke up with a heavy brain, being pawed at by the dog, with a “where am I” feeling. When am I. It’s a weary sort of magic, being haunted by a version of your life that’s been edited by a glitchy subconscious.

But let’s talk about the weirdly specific set dressing of these dreams, because I’m starting to think my internal interior designer is trying to stage an intervention.

The Doors that Don’t Lead to the Pantry

In this recurring dream-space, the doors are never just doors. They’re suggestions. In a dream of my old apartment off 13th, there was a door behind the refrigerator that definitely wasn’t there in real life. In the dream, I opened it, and it led to a balcony overlooking the neighborhood behind, from three floors up. Mad trick for a one-floor apartment!

What are doors, in dreams?

Doors are the “what ifs” we’re too exhausted to deal with during our waking hours. (I’ll take what’s behind Door #3, Monty!) They represent the transitions we’re terrified of making or the opportunities we’ve locked away because we’re too busy trying to remember our Netflix password. When the house is different, the doors are the brain’s way of saying, “Hey, look at all these exits you aren’t taking.” It’s irreverent, really—my mind building a grand portal to a new life right next to the place where I used to keep the trash bags.

It feels like a nudge. A “get out while you can” from a version of myself that’s much more adventurous (and much less tired) than I am.

Windows to a Weirdly Different Soul

Then there are the windows. In the dream version of the house where I grew up, the windows are massive—floor-to-ceiling glass that looks out onto a world that’s shifted five degrees to the left. The light is different; it’s gold and thick like honey, but the view is of a manatee-filled spring where there used to be a 6-acre field of blueberry bushes, grapevines, and apple trees.

If doors are about where we’re going, windows are about how we’re seeing the wreckage we left behind. When the view is different in a place you know by heart, it’s the ultimate “perspective shift” metaphor that hits you with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. My brain is literally showing me that I can look at my past through a different lens, even if the frame is still the same old rotting wood.

It’s hopeful, in a way. It’s the realization that while the past is fixed and static, the way we perceive it is as fluid as the dream we’re in. We’re allowed to see trees where there used to be concrete. We’re allowed to let the light in, even if the house itself is a monument to a time we’d rather forget.

The Menagerie of the Subconscious

And oh, the pets. The dream pets.

Last night, one of my many childhood dogs was there – one who’s been gone for twenty years – but she was there, and she was the size of a Shetland Pony. She just trotted back and forth on the house-long screened-in porch, looking at me with those ancient, soulful eyes. And wagging that big fuzzy tail, not at all concerned that either she’s thirty years old, or quite dead. And in the dream, I wasn’t surprised to see her at all. Of course she was there! She lived in that house. It would have been strange if she WASN’T there.

Pets in these shifting houses are the anchors. They’re the parts of us that are still loyal, still innocent, and still happy to see ourselves show up. When they appear in a house that’s “wrong,” they might be the only thing that feels “right.” They represent the unconditional love we forget to give ourselves. My dream-dog isn’t just a ghost; she’s the guardian of the parts of me that haven’t become jaded yet. She’s the hope that survives the renovation of the dream house.

The Getaway Car (That Has No Brakes)

Finally, there’s the car. Parked as usual at the bottom of the ramp up to the porch, but the driveway has come to the house by a completely different route. In the dream, it’s my second car – the one that smelled like bad decisions, the one that tree fell on that one time. But in the dream, the interior is now lined with velvet and the dashboard is a galaxy.

Cars are our agency. They’re how we move through the world, or at least how we think we’re moving. When the car is different, it’s a reflection of our resilience. We might be driving a relic of our past, but we’ve upgraded the engine. We’re still navigating the same roads, but we’ve got a better sound system for those in-car concerts starring me.

The car in the dream is often impossible to drive—the brakes are spongy, or the steering wheel is made of licorice, or for some really fucked up reason I’m trying to drive while sitting in the back seat…..???????…… which is basically just a Tuesday for me. It’s that “everything is on fire but I’m still steering” energy. It’s the radical honesty of admitting that while we have the vehicle to move forward, we’re still figuring out how the hell to get it in gear.

The Architecture of “Still Here”

Why do we keep going back to these warped versions of our history?

I think it’s because we’re trying to reconcile the person who lived there with the person who’s standing here now, staring at a wall and feeling weary. The house is the map of our survival. Every extra room is a year we made it through. Every window with a new view is a lesson we finally learned, even if we had to learn it the hard way (which, let’s be real, is the only way I learn anything).

There is something so profoundly vulnerable about being lost in a place you’re supposed to know. It’s a confession that we don’t have all the answers, that the “home” we’re looking for isn’t a physical location, but a state of mind where the doors actually open when we turn the knob.

It’s a hot mess of a psychological landscape, but it’s mine. I built these extra hallways with my own two hands and a lot of late-night ruminations. And a lot of blog posts like this, haha!

The world outside my window right now doesn’t have a neon desert or a talking French dog. It just has a dark sky and a neighbor who really needs to tone down the Led Zeppelin (srsly, dude, I can’t even see your house but I can hear your 20 minute guitar solos?). But I can still feel the warmth of that sun-battered, weathered cedar porch ramp in my bones. I can still smell the sheep barn.

We are more than the square footage of our current lives. We are the sum of every house we’ve ever inhabited, plus the additions we’re still building in the dark.

I’m weary, yeah. I’m tired of the interior renovation. But there’s a small, crafty part of me that’s excited to see what room my brain builds next. Maybe tonight there will be a sunroom. Or a spa. Or just a quiet corner where the existential dread is replaced by a really good sandwich.

One can hope.