often the dreams involve difficulties in communication. this is a common dream theme. like trying to decipher what someone is saying under water, only instead of shouting or straining to hear, I am measuring my words...reigning in my desire to speak, treading lightly, scanning the faces in the room considering what I *might* say, clenching my fists, my jaw. In the dream last night I was in a house near my childhood home. It felt as though it was located in an old strip mall that had been converted into a tiny beach village-- narrow streets and wooden clapboard fences and dirt alleys. The house was crowded with a variety of people, living and dead, familiar and strange, old and young. There are many details that remain familiar -- the need to do laundry, the lack of curtains in the showers, the absence of hallways (simply room flowing into room), the general sense of almost poverty and dirt. But the detail that remains most vivid involves my hair. In the dream my hair, as it is in life, was long and thick. One of my friends or roommates -- it seemed we all lived together in all the houses, sometimes switching houses and rooms-- was a hairdresser. In the house I was in, there were many young girls between the ages of 5 and 12. They seemed to be without parents, and I had a sense of wanting to take care of them. Although they all had long dark hair (like mine), they needed more hair. I'm not sure why. Visibly, I couldn't see why they needed hair, but I felt and knew that they did. The hairdresser friend suggested that I donate some of my hair. I agreed. But somehow, before we could discuss how much or from what part of my head the hair would come, he had reached over and sheared the left side of my head. I wasn't completely bald, but my head was very lopsided. I wanted to complain; the hair on the right side of my head is much thicker than it is on the left and had we discussed it, I would have asked him to take hair from the right side. I was angry at his presumption and arrogance. But I didn't want to complain because one of the little girls had already sewn my hair into hers. I didn't want her to feel my surprise or anger at the man with the scissors because I didn't want her to worry that I didn't want her to have my hair. Instead of registering my disappointment with my friend, I said very loudly "I'm so glad that she has my hair." I said it very loudly several times. Everyone looked over at me and smiled. Later, when everyone was busy again, I went into the dusty alley and cried. It wasn't even a feeling of loss or sadness about the hair, but rather a feeling of terrible loneliness from which it seemed there would never be any escape.