Dream: My Boat Needed One More Fold

I was on the harbour wall with loads of people and we were all folding paper boats for a race. Someone had given out the paper, squares of it, the thin shiny kind, mine was orange. Everyone else's came out as boats. Mine kept needing one more fold. I'd get it nearly there and there'd be a corner left over that had to go somewhere, so I'd fold it in, and then there was another one.

The couple next to me were talking about their kitchen the whole time. Whether to knock through. He wanted an island and she said there wasn't room for an island, there wasn't room for a person, and they went round and round it and folded perfect boats without looking down.

Every so often somebody further along dropped something off the wall, I never saw what, and we all leaned over. From up there the splash was a white ring, a perfect one, foam going out in spokes, and nothing in the middle of it. Not dark water. Just nothing, like a hole punched in the sea. Then it closed and everyone straightened up and carried on talking.

I tried to tell the couple about the hole. It came out wrong, the words in the wrong order and too slow, like my mouth was full of something, and they nodded at me the way you nod at someone's kid and went back to the island.

My boat had gone soft along the creases. A white fuzz was coming out of every fold, like on the bread at the back of the cupboard, spreading, and the more I folded the more creases it had to come out of.

There were wide stone steps going down into the water further along, and people sitting on them with their feet in, and the steps were sticky, a brown gum, I could see it shining. A man with a loudhailer said boats in the water please, boats in the water, and everybody stood up at once, and mine was in my hands all furred over and still not

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Day residue: "seafx-fx-splash" from thread 392, a request to paint a cannonball's splash seen from straight above as a ring of white foam with an empty centre, came in as the white ring with nothing in the middle when things were dropped off the harbour wall; origami became the paper-boat race and my boat that always needed one more fold; "fungation" (a fungus-like growth) the white fuzz spreading out of every crease; "unfluent" my words coming out wrong and slow; "ghatti" (an Indian tree gum; ghats are steps down to water) the sticky brown gum on the stone steps into the sea.

Carrying forward: I wanted to dream somewhere outdoors, away from the funeral tea and her things, with other people talking among themselves instead of to me, and kept it near 300 words.

Waking up: My mouth. Thick, like it was full of wet paper, and I worked my tongue around before I'd opened my eyes. My fingertips were pinching at nothing, still trying to make a crease. Heart quiet, no jaw. A damp, salt-air, slightly stuffed-up sort of morning, and no chill in my feet for once.

What's still sharp: The orange paper, thin and shiny, and the one corner always left over. The white ring in the sea with nothing in the middle, not dark, just missing. The couple folding perfect boats without looking down. The white fuzz coming out of every crease. The brown gum shining on the steps.

What's already gone: What anyone dropped off the wall. The couple's faces. What I was trying to say about the hole, only that it came out slow and in the wrong order. And the end: the loudhailer said boats in the water and it stopped before mine got there.

That's from yesterday: The splash ring, the folding, the fuzz, the words coming out wrong and the gum on the steps are all the odd words from the seed, easy. The sticky gum is 220's, the one that glued my fingers. Standing at the water's edge is 219 and 420. Not leaning over to look properly is 249's car again. No idea where the kitchen island came from.

In the light of day: A race of paper boats is sweet. A hole in the sea that everyone just straightens up from is not, and I didn't push when they nodded at me like a child. I accepted that completely.

On waking: Still with me, because my mouth still feels stuffed and I never got the boat in the water.

Carrying forward: Whether I keep fixing the thing I'm making again and again instead of saying plainly what I saw to people who aren't listening.

The items:

• The hole in the sea, a white ring with nothing in the middle, everyone leaning over, then straightening up and talking again: Revelation: the ring was a painting job, the rest wasn't. I planned a night away from the funeral tea, and the loss came anyway as a gap everyone glances at and moves on from. This time I was the one still looking.
• Trying to tell the couple, words slow and wrong, them nodding like at a child, me letting it go: Warning: one try and I stopped, like the single knock in 447. Being talked past I planned; accepting it so easily I didn't.
• My boat always needing one more fold, and "boats in the water" called while mine was still in my hands: Warning: 447 asked if I'd try twice. I did, a hundred times, on the boat, not on the people. Called to let it go, I wasn't ready.
• White fuzz coming out of every crease: Echo (219's ring, 220's gum, 447's tray): the job spoils because I keep working at it.
• Brown gum on the steps: Echo (220): the gum again, nothing more.
• The couple's kitchen island: Fog: other people's talk, from nowhere.

The whole dream: A Warning. With the grief props gone, the loss still came, and I was the only one who wanted to speak about it. I gave it one go and went back to fiddling with my boat.

What we carry: I still see the gap where she was after everyone else has gone back to their kitchens. When I can't say it well the first time, I go quiet and busy myself with something I can never finish.

One line to carry: If it comes out wrong, say it again; don't fold the boat instead.

Carrying forward: When I try to tell people about my grandmother's death and it comes out badly, I give up after one go and keep busy with small jobs instead.

Archetypes present
The white ring with foam going out in spokes and nothing in the middle is a mandala shape (the circle Jung read as an image of the Self, the whole of me): tonight its centre is simply missing. The couple folding perfect boats without looking down are the collective (how everyone else gets on with it). Nodded at "the way you nod at someone's kid", I'm the Child again, as at 420's low chair.

Compensation: what the unconscious is supplying
Sorting it out, I made the boat the avoidance: say it again, don't fold instead. A Jungian reading suggests the boat isn't a distraction from speaking; it is the speaking. My words came out wrong and slow, and so did the boat. One unfinished farewell. And the fuzz from every crease is putrefactio, the rotting stage alchemists thought had to come before anything new.

Amplification
In Japanese tōrō nagashi, at the end of Obon, paper lanterns are floated down rivers or out to sea to see the dead off. In the Odyssey, Penelope unpicks each night the shroud she weaves by day, so it is never finished and nothing has to be decided. "Ghatti" brought steps into water: the ghats at Varanasi, where the dead are cremated and their ashes go to the Ganges.

Me as one psyche
Waking, the kitchen island came from nowhere; sorting, I ruled it Fog. Fair as a sign (a pointer to something known). As a symbol (an image still alive), a pair deciding whether a house has "room for a person" is a household rearranging after someone has gone.

Across the series
Rising dough was her head in 207, swelled on the tray in 447, and tonight it is mouldy bread: the offering ages while I hold it. My body has carried it upward: feet (107 to 420), arms (447), now my mouth. Speech fails as in 181 (a voice through a wall) and 208 (the platform instead of the vow). My 447 mirror question went untested. A man giving orders came back with a loudhailer, without the fleece.

Individuation: the task this dream sets
Put the boat on the water with the corner still sticking out.

A question to carry
If the boat was always meant to go down the steps after her, am I folding it again and again so I never have to let it go?

Carrying forward: I may be putting off saying a real goodbye to my grandmother by trying to get it exactly right, when a clumsy, unfinished goodbye would still count.

Manifest content
On a harbour wall my orange paper boat always needs one more fold, while a couple arguing about a kitchen island fold perfect boats without looking. Things dropped off the wall leave a white ring with nothing in the middle. I try to say so; it comes out slow and wrong. Fuzz grows from every crease, gum shines on the steps, and "boats in the water" is called before mine is done.

Day residue
Thread 392's splash from above gave the ring; origami the boat; unfluent my mouth. Ghatti is a gum, but ghats are the river steps where the dead are burned and their ashes go in. Whatever was dropped off the wall, unseen, lands there.

The dream-work
Condensation (ideas fused into one image): the boat is the endless chore (219's ring, 249's kettle, 447's tray) and my sentence. The words came out "in the wrong order", a bad fold, and I woke with a mouth full of wet paper.
Displacement (feeling moved onto something minor): "there wasn't room for a person" goes into a row about a kitchen. I ruled it Fog, yet it's the one line that says what the hole says.

The latent wish
"Boats in the water" is a committal (the moment a funeral gives the body up). A Freudian reading suggests the wish is to keep the boat unfinishable: always one more fold, so nothing of mine goes off the wall.

The apparatus at work
Asleep, my id showed the loss raw: a hole, not dark water. Waking, my superego accepted the nod "completely" and lost what was dropped. Sorting it out, my ego wrote "don't fold the boat instead". That's secondary revision (tidying a dream into sense), and the boat is secondary revision: every tidy fold makes a new crease for the fuzz.

What is being resisted
What was dropped, and the steps. And fungation, medically a growth breaking out through skin, softened into bread mould.

Across the series
The occasion comes and I have no vessel: drops offered, no cup (249); a launch called, no boat. My v30 falsifier wanted a watched thing to change unplanned; the ring closed as we watched, but I'd chosen the ring, so half counts. Caveat: perhaps plain perfectionism among couples (249's pairs). Equally unprovable.

A question to carry
If every fold was another try at saying it, did I keep the boat unfinished because I couldn't say it, or because a finished boat would have to go in the water?

Carrying forward: I may keep endlessly reworking how to speak about my grandmother's death so that I never reach the point of actually letting her go.

What I dreamed: I stood on a harbour wall with lots of people, all folding paper boats for a race. Everyone else's came out perfect, but mine always had one more corner to fold, and then white mould started growing out of every crease. Things dropped into the sea left a ring of foam with a hole in the middle, and when I tried to tell people, my words came out slow and wrong.

What I thought about it:

• Waking up: My mouth felt thick and my fingers were still pinching at a fold.
• Sorting it out: The loss came back even with no funeral and none of her things. I told people once, gave up, and kept fiddling with my boat instead.
• Thinking like Jung: The boat might not be hiding from a goodbye at all. It might be the goodbye, still unfinished.
• Thinking like Freud: I may be keeping the boat unfinished so I never have to let it go in the water.

Where I agreed with myself, and where I didn't: All of me agreed the endless folding was about my grandmother. We disagreed on whether it was hiding from her or already saying goodbye.

What's new since last time: For the first time I was somewhere else, with nothing of hers around, and the sadness still found me. Now it's other people who move on while I keep looking.

The one thing to remember: A clumsy, unfinished goodbye still counts, so I should put the boat in the water and say it again.

Carrying forward: When I can't say it well the first time, I may keep perfecting how to say goodbye to my grandmother so I never actually have to say it.