A Trip to My Aunt's Old House, in a Foreign Country

2/9/2008 - Last night's dream.

The last few nights I've been very tired and lacking in sleep, which generally causes me not to remember my dreams. But last night I caught up on it and remembered a bit.

I was in a place that looked like a foreign country. It was green and hilly and had ruins and very old buildings built into the hillsides, somewhere in Europe I think. I traveled through, taking in the sights. The area I was in was out in the country. There were a lot of small houses, scattered about, mixed in with some very old small ones built out of stacked and mortared rounded rocks which now were converted into people's back sheds and such. My Aunt N- had a house here, and I was going to see it. It was a house she had lived in as a child once and had returned to look at, although I think she was going to sell it and not stay there. I was going to describe it and take pictures for some project of my own.

On my way I saw something I wanted to stop and look at. I decided to walk up the hill to see it, and continue up to her house, which was at the top of the hill. I walked up about halfway to a sort of cave. It was one of the stone houses built into the hillside, an old ruin part of a building built hundreds of years before, of which there were many around here. It was now being used by someone as a woodshed. At first I felt nervous walking in, since of course I didn't belong there, but then someone came, possibly the owner, and showed me around. I think it was an old guy pleased to have it be a tourist attraction.

I looked around the dimly lit inside, the wood was stacked meticulously against all the walls in enormous heaps. The pieces of wood were each only a few inches long, split to that uniform size. I found the magnitude of the woodpiles and their exacting construction quite fascinating, and I took a few pictures, although I was concerned they might not turn out because of the dim light inside and the bright daytime light coming in through the doorways. I found myself describing it in my head for the piece I would write about my trip.

Then I climbed up the hill and arrived at the house my Aunt was at. It was more modern, but still built decades ago in or before her childhood. She didn't seem too pleased to see me although she had been expecting me, but took me in and showed me through the rooms, without much interest. I took note of the interesting features. The rooms were differently made, narrow and antique and irregularly shaped. There was a dangerous looking laundry chute several stories deep. The staircase was wooden with close, narrow steps, and curved up to a dark upstairs. I looked at it and she, somewhat indifferently but smugly, told me I should check out the feature of the slide. I moved a wooden lever on the side of the staircase, and the steps rotated so the stair became a smooth slide, something that now reminds me of some Little Nemo strips (although it didn't in the dream. In the dream I'd heard of this feature before from movies but never actually seen one, and I thought it was rather nifty to be able to examine one in person). She recalled enjoying sliding down it as a child. I was looking through a few other rooms on the ground floor and taking notes as my Aunt stood by, when my Uncle drove up in the parking lot below. We went to the open door and looked down to the gravel lot below. He greeted us cheerily. I remembered I had brought some items for him, and gave them to him. There were three of them, but I don't remember what they were any more. Then there was a fourth item, which was a photo album collection that included pictures of me from a play or show I'd been in some years ago. I don't remember what it was for or what he had needed it for. He politely accepted all the items, with thanks.

My aunt somewhat snippily said aside to me that he already had two of the items, which she and/or someone else had given him previously, and the third had come up in discussion in the past and he'd said he didn't like it. I was somewhat unsure how to respond to this, she was obviously displeased with me for bringing the items. I said something like he'd accepted them pleasantly enough or seemed to like them. Of course, she acted as if she knew better, being his wife and all and therefore privy to such things which I wouldn't be. It struck me she was acting jealous of me for some reason. She was more openly displeased about the photo collection, specifically because of the types of photos of myself that were included. I felt that the whole situation had become rather uncomfortable.

Here my recollection becomes disjointed, but I remember driving somewhere away from there with somebody, and it was nearing Easter time.