Book of Dreams

A collection of dreams; Freud would have a field day. Most seem to relate to disorientated travel experiences; worryingly one or two include premonitions of bizarre airport security practices which have actually now been introduced and which seem relatively normal...as airport security goes!

Flying Home

Walking up a hill somewhere in North Oxfordshire. I know it is there, because of the smell in the air, the way the birds sing, everything is familiar and safe. But for some inexplicable reason I am rushing to get to the top of the hill with my children stumbling along in my wake. No sooner do we reach the top than I realise I am late for my return flight home to Norway. We take the tram or rather we would if there was one. From each horizon the tracks run to meet us through an endless suburbia with grass growing between the rails, but not a single tram in sight. We start hurrying down the hill, but again I am delayed by something I have to do at the top of the hill. My daughter wanders off with her mother and my son is being left behind as I rush towards the airport. I know I cannot conceivably reach Heathrow in time on foot, but miraculously there are my parents sitting in their car in a lay-by.

There are two flights I can take: one from LHR at 17.50 and another from LGW at 19.00. I remember this clearly from my last trip. It is now 16.15 and we are an hour’s drive from LHR, assuming I drive. My father, once a dashing young man and an excellent driver, now has a Volvo and drives as though he wears a hat. It will take him at least 90 minutes, but I can still just make the flight. Strange how in dreams some things are so clear and I can do relatively complex calculations. Or at least I can convince myself that I am doing them fairly well. In this case I work out that I will arrive just before the flight leaves and so I could make it if the flight is delayed. My mother asks if there is a later flight, knowing we are unlikely to make the first one. She is horrified at the prospect of having to drive all the way to LGW and I realise that taking the bus connection is a non-starter.

To save time we do not go back to my hotel to collect my luggage, but then we have to pass by their home to pick up a few essentials. Quite why I need a sponge and other toiletries when I am on my way home I cannot work out, but suddenly my hands are full of old sponges, nail brushes and all the other paraphernalia which normally sits along the edge of their bath.

We arrive at the airport which it seems is Luton, a place I have never flown from, but which features regularly in my dreams. I think I went there once as a child to meet someone way back in the late ‘60s. Of course I need to get my ticket validated as I have changed airports, but think at least I can check in at the ticket desk as I only have hand luggage. No, they will not allow me to take sponges into the cabin and insist I check in my poly bags of toiletries. Someone offers to check in my stuff so I can rush to the plane which is supposedly leaving on time...now. I find myself in a corridor and push through the first door in front of me. It is a large hangar containing numerous aircraft, including old propeller driven planes and helicopters. I think the four-engined plane at the end of the row could make it to Oslo and make my way towards it. As I get nearer it gets further away and I realise I am on one of those dream conveyors. I know I have to find the correct plane, but keep being distracted by the possibility of all these other planes. I have to find the departure area and the correct gate.

I open another door which seems to lead upwards. I can see the silhouette of the stairs through the frosted glass partitioning. I climb the stairs and on exiting the stairwell, find myself on a gantry way up in the hangar roof area. It is a dead end and I have wasted yet more time on a fruitless detour. To save time I slide down the handrail and open the door at the bottom again. Now this door opens into an office space and I am confronted by what at first appears to be a receptionist or security guard. As I get closer I realise it is just his posture that makes him look like a security man, but I ask him anyway where the departure gates are. He points out onto the tarmac apron and explains that it is a very long way around the other side of the complex. Without listening further I rush outside, hoping that my flight may be a bus gate and that I may just stumble upon the plane with the stairs still accessible out here on the apron. A stewardess in pink approaches and asks if I am Mr Harrison, which I am.

“Then you will need a new freezer.”

“How do you know?”

“Because your luggage has to be taken into the plane.”

She indicates the flimsy pink poly bags overflowing with toiletries and I am tempted to retort that I had wanted to take them on in the first place, but it was at their insistence that I had checked them in. But then she explained that the airline would pay for my new freezer if I would take the bags on board. I began discarding the unnecessary items and realised there was in fact nothing in the bags I wanted to keep.

As I finished stuffing the last items into the ridiculously small rubbish bins she dragged me onto the plane through the rear access door. It was a BEA Trident with a paint finish reminiscent of the standard I used to achieve when I made Airfix models. I noticed that all the stewardesses were in pink though I had definitely booked a BA flight. Before I could question these inconsistencies, the plane started to accelerate and, realising I would not make it to my seat, I fell backwards into the staff seat in the rear galley and struggled to do up my belt. This was all the more essential because the rear door was still open and I risked being flung back and out.

The plane thundered down the runway which now became familiar as the runway of previous dream flights. It sloped gently up and then plunged steeply down. It was very narrow for a runway, about the width of a country lane and covered in thick grass. There were ruts of hard dry earth where the planes ran and on either side there was a footpath. It was clear that the runway just faded into a field ahead of us and the old plane accelerated so slowly that I really doubted we would make it. As we approached the end of the runway I noticed children in the distance like specks walking beside the runway. We approached them with frightening rapidity and they ducked to avoid the wings. The pilot swerved slightly to avoid them and the others ran off to the side, all except two girls who walked oblivious to our approach along the middle of the grassy runway. At the last minute the plane lifted up the nose wheel and we missed the girls by a matter of inches.

The field ahead was in fact the grass surrounding a housing area comprising detached houses and tower blocks. The co-pilot complained that we always flew over the flats rather than the houses even though it was dangerous. He said it was because the rich people lived in houses and so we tried not to make too much noise. We narrowly missed the top of the buildings and seemed unable to climb away from the ground which now sloped steeply up towards us. The runway was on one side of the valley sloping down and now we were approaching the other side. There were two large wooden poles, like telegraph poles crossed over on the ground and the co-pilot, who I had now become, reached out to grab one of these so as to remove it from our path. I held it in my arms and it quickly grew too heavy to hold. But we were still over the children and the houses so I could not just let it go. The captain circled the plane as if to gain height, but the circles were so tight (because of the narrow valley we were trapped in) that we seemed to side-slip down as fast as we climbed. I desperately wanted to let go of the log, but had to wait until it was safe.

As I was awoken by my alarm I worried as to whether I had succeeded in carrying the log away from danger.