Snakes on the High Street

I don’t even want to count the days anymore. Counting only draws attention to the fact that we’re in this for the long haul. Three weeks is easily going to turn into six months, so I might as well get myself mentally prepared for that. Our face masks arrived yesterday. I don’t think it will be long before the government makes wearing masks in public a mandatory thing. France is the latest country to do a U-turn, joining others – the US, Austria and Singapore – in advising the public to wear them.  For now it’s just advice.  But soon, I reckon, it will be mandatory.

I was startled out of my sleep this morning by my dream.

In this dream, I was walking down the high street in Southam on my way back to see someone. I was walking and thinking about starting another podcast. I didn’t want to start a “live” show because people don’t listen live, they prefer podcasts. I was thinking maybe I could start a Marc Maron style podcast. In the middle of my thoughts while walking, I noticed there were a lot of slugs on the pavement. Big brown slugs. I took a closer look and realised that they were actually slugs morphing into snakes. I thought I was imaging the slug/snakes were following me. It wasn’t until one of the slugs became a full on snake that I realised they were actually after me. This one snake in particular drew a bead on me and started coming directly for me.  I walked faster, but it was gaining on me. I had a sudden flash of inspiration. If I walked onto the busy main road and the snake followed me, it would get turnover by a car. Just as I stepped backwards off of the curb, the snake struck. I jumped awake.

I believe our subconscious mind sometimes communicates to us through our dreams. I looked up what it means when you dream of snakes. Here’s what Google had to say:

Snakes commonly symbolize fear or transformation. Dreaming of a snake is a sign that you are afraid of something in your waking life, or it could be a forewarning of changes to come… or

A snake in your dream may represent something in your life that is unpredictable and out of your control. You are afraid of the unknown. Snake refers to hidden threats: Because snakes are sometimes hard to see and are slithering in bushes, they are also symbolic of a hidden threat and/or a betrayal.

I can see there is probably a direct correlation between my dream and what’s going on in the waking world at the moment, but I wonder if there is more to the story. There was some stuff that happened before this scene in my dream, but the details are fuzzy. I may need to tease those out in order to get a better understanding of this dream.

Photo by H Shaw on Unsplash

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