Houses as reflections of soul

I'm up late tonight laying in bed, and I just remembered a dream that I had last night.

The dream was concerning a house that I used to live next door to in my old hometown that is 10 hours away from where I live now. This house was an old stucco styled, two-story home. When we moved in next door into the house that we built, there was a lady named Mary who passed away about 5 years later, and I was 10 or so. Several families have come and gone, different owners have occupied the home, but its always seemed to be "old." In fact, my mom and dad lived there when my brother was born, before they moved to town about a year before I was born.

Anyway, in this dream, it was snowing, heavily. I was going out to my mailbox to put Christmas gifts inside. I had a whole sled full of packages and the snow was blowing so hard. I made it to the end of my driveway with the packages, and I noticed a young woman walking over to me from the stucco home. It was probably around 7 o'clock in the evening and the moon was out and full (odd, because it was in the middle of a snow storm). She came over and invited me to come to the house to meet her mother and sister, of whom she lived with, and also to see how it looked inside, as the previous owner had done some spectacular renovations. I agreed and followed her over.

We walked inside and the home was a mansion, unlike what I've ever known the home to be - which was small, old, nearly dangerous to be inside with old paint and gas heating. There were rooms I had never known to exist inside, as well as a completely redone kitchen. There were now 3 stories, instead of two. It literally resembled that of a Aspen Colorado cabin of grandeur.

I met the young ladies mother and sister. They lived there together. I don't remember their names, but I do remember that they were beautiful. They didn't resemble each other at all, seemingly.

They took me on a tour of the home. More changes before my eyes. A grand atrium in the middle of the home that all the rooms surrounded. Everything was a deep rich pine wood from the floor, to the walls, to the support posts, to the ceiling. It was a decorative wood style as well - slats of wood placed strategically in perfectly symmetrical patterns and shapes. Past the 3rd floor was an attic that the women raved about. It was only half finished, but they didn't seem to mind - but they went on and on about the treasures that they were finding between the cracks of wood floor paneling in the attic - things that were from a different era of time, which gave them an adventuristic desire to learn about who had lived in the house in the past. They led me up to the attic, and I was surprised to see that this is where the renovations had abruptly stopped. It looked as though they started to refinish the attic area, but then were interrupted. Half way up the stairs, the wood slat-work stopped, and the drywall began, and the stairs were all of a sudden old again and creaky, old planks that felt as though they could give out at any moment. The attic smelled of old must, and I could see partially planked walk areas, lit only by the reflection of the light from below off the ceiling of the attic. The attic only went as far back as I would imagine the "normal size" of the house to be, not this "new" size that the house seemed to have grown into.

I ran my fingers through the cracks of the wooden planks where I traced gaps and holes with my tips. I found a few little pieces of paper that had my mother's aunt's name on them. This confused me, as my mom's aunt had never lived in this house before. Confused, I turned and asked the mother how much she bought the house for. She replied "Only $147,000. It was an absolute STEAL."

We climbed back down from the attic, and went all the way back to the kitchen on the main floor, and chatted around the huge marble island . We discussed the previous owner and what he looked like (tall, with a full head of dark hair and a dark mustache - a very pronounced looking man in his late 40's or early 50's).

Then my dream was over.

I'm not sure what this dream means.

The night before I had a dream about jumping in the "S" river that is just down the hill from my home 10 hours away from here. I don't remember WHY I jumped in - I think I was running from someone. I jumped into a canoe, but the dam didn't exist in my dream, and the water was flowing the opposite way than normal. I floated past a few other boats of fishermen, or people of "interesting" nature (meaning I didnt' quite catch what they were doing, who they were, or why they were there), and also people on shabby man made rafts put together out of tree trunks. I also passed some cows wading in the river as well. I remember thinking that it must be a season of drought because otherwise the cows would be swept away in an instant. Before I reached the 1st bridge, I knew that I needed to jump out of my canoe and swim ashore because after the second bridge, there would be no hope for me to be able to swim ashore as the current would increase dramatically, and there would be no shore to grab onto. Then the dream ended.

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Last night's dream - I'm too tired now to try to analize, but I'm up writing about it because (1) I didn't want to forget it, and (2) I've really been thinking about houses a lot lately. I know that sounds really funny. Not thinking about houses in the sense that I want to purchase one (although that topic will be coming up sooner than later in my life in the next few months), but more or less about the "life" with in a house - the physical structure of a house.

Have you ever noticed how a house has life only when life is within? If the life within moves out, the house is empty in more ways than just physically being empty. And also, it doesnt' really even matter if someone moves out - it can be if a person goes away for 6 months or any period of time, and there is someone to keep the grounds, the house seems to slump in dismay.

I've noticed this before over the course of time, but I really started to think about it over Christmas when I went running past a house that we were going to purchase in my husband's hometown a few months back before the Lord took us to a different town. The house hadn't been lived in for a few months yet it was dark and dismay and simply empty. No life whatsoever. Since we've moved to our current place, with in the last 6 months, a new family has purchased the home, and when I ran by, I noticed that not one physical thing had changed about the house, except for it had a glow about it. Even the roof line seemed to not slump any longer. There was life and light and joy exuding from the windows. It was the oddest thing. Could it be possible that homes have "souls" as well? Or are they just metaphors of our souls when we have life and light and joy within? Maybe both? I don't know...... Thoughts?

I suppose I should go to bed now and let these crazy thoughts subside. I'm sure I'll have more dreams to discuss soon.....