Cover for Me
The Dreamer is inside of his old landlord’s luxury house.
It is dark. The Dreamer is sneaking around the house. Then he is trying to find his way out before he is found out. He cannot find an exit. Then he sees a cute dog, like a Golden Doodle. Then there is a real estate agent in the house. The Dreamer is trying to find a way to legally remain in the house. Then the Dreamer is looking at a contract, that has the landlord’s name on it. That’s not going to work. Then the landlord is home. The Dreamer asks the agent to “cover for me”: the agent agrees. Then the Dreamer is looking for an exit again. He tries to go through the basement but it is locked. The landlord is lurking around. He exits the house through a french door on the main level, the kind where you have to push up on the door handle to unlock it. The landlord is always a step ahead. Then the Dreamer is running away. Then a dog (not cute) like a Doberman is running after the Dreamer. Then the dog bites the Dreamer in the arm. The Dreamer is still running with the dog on his arm. Then the Dreamer gets free of the dog and is climbing up a chain link fence. Then there is another dog and it tears the Dreamer down. Then the Dreamer is outside on his back. There are a bunch of other unknown people, friends of the landlord. They look at the Dreamer and shake their head at him in disappointment. Then there is an Asian man who falls down. Then the Asian man is empathizing with the Dreamer: he asks the people who are looking on — “don’t you feel bad when someone else feels bad”?
Context: There are elements of this dream that recur from earlier motifs about attitudes toward luxury (“Riches to Rags”). Also in a previous dream (Grocery Store Drama), the Dreamer has conspired with someone to “cover for him”. There is also a recurring theme around dogs, which are symbolic of the Dreamer’s relation to his instincts.
Associations: My wife and I lived on this property when we first moved to Virginia almost twenty years ago. We lived in the guest cottage of an estate with a very nice, large, luxury house as the main house. We sometimes did errands for the landlord, and took care of their house. Sometimes we would wander the house, in awe of how big and fancy it was to us. I associate those people, our previous landlords, as very rich but not very happy.
Feelings: fear, pain
Interpretation: This is a dream about an attitude toward wealth. The “landlord’s house” is another version of the “friend Rory’s house”: both of them are associated with luxury from the Dreamer’s perspective. In both dreams, the Dreamer is lurking around, he is there even though he does not belong there. He could just leave, but he doesn’t: he keeps lurking. The Dreammaker is suggesting that the attitude about wealth, to make believe that this is “his house”, used to be cute like a Golden Doodle, but now the attitude is causing real harm to the Dreamer’s instincts, like a Doberman bite: perhaps the Dreamer needs to take this attitude adjustment toward wealth, luxury, and his values more seriously: the act is not cute anymore.
