I dreamed of spiders. Everywhere. But they were intelligent on a level I could understand. Perhaps my recent shedding of my arachnophobia caused this dream, or perhaps it's because Santa Barbara seems to be drowning in 8-leggies this hot summer, but spiders ruled the earth in this dream.
I spent the dream trying to understand why this was so.
I spent most of my time in the dream speaking with a very large wolf spider, who was weaving a tale of his family, his innumerable offspring, his mate, and his webs. I found beauty in the tale, and didn't want it to end.
But it had to, as I was overcome with a compulsion to kill a number of smaller spiders that were living together in the same web. Egg sacs were everywhere in the web, and I felt guilty for wanting to kill the unborn with poison. My friend spider split into four distinct creatures, each representing a reason why I should not destroy the smaller spiders.
The head, which pleaded reason and rational thought, telling me that to kill is wrong.
The legs, which told me I could run away, and if I ran far enough, I'd find a different world, telling me that I didn't belong in the world of the spiders and I had to run to find my own place.
The abdomen, which said it ruled emotion and that it was sick and dying. It said I would become it if I gave in to my urges. It didn't want me to be sick, or to die. It wanted me to live.
The eyes, which were six, wanted me to see the beauty in all life, and so I took them, and placed them into my own eyes.
The next thing I know, I'm in a small room, sitting on a bed with steel legs. Wrapped around one of the legs was a spider, sleeping. I didn't want to wake it, so I woke up instead.