Dream:

My husband is trying to kill a spider on the wall.  The spider is peeking out from underneath a curled up piece of wallpaper, so just a leg or two pokes out.  He hits the wall, paper towel in hand, but keeps missing it, as one or more of the “spider legs” keeps moving out of the way.  As he continues trying, the leg keeps growing larger and larger.  He gets frustrated and says to me, “I can’t do this.  You kill this thing!” The leg keeps getting bigger.  We both wince as we think we are about to witness the largest spider ever, emerging from beneath the paper.  But, we are surprised to find that what we are looking at is not, in fact, a spider leg but is actually an enormous tentacle.  A giant nautilus-like creature pops out from underneath the wallpaper, and it is holding a wild boar with one of its arms.  The boar is hanging upside down.  The nautilus has a massive eye, which glares at us.  Both the nautilus and the boar are very wet and shiny, coated in some type of viscous oil. As we watch, our jaws open, the nautilus scurries up into the ceiling.  It disappears and we are left standing there, my husband holding his unused paper towel in his hand.  I am pretty sure the boar was dead.

Meanwhile, we have a fire lit in the living room – but either because of embers popping out from the hearth, or simply due to a (severe?) lack of humidity in the room, parts of the living room keep spontaneously bursting into flames.  A wooden chair.  A stack of records.  The bookshelf.  I try to blow out the small fires each time they spring up.  Our white chair is scorched.  I think that I should keep checking on the room every 20 minutes or so to make sure the whole room doesn’t become engulfed in flames.  The bottoms of the doors leading into the living room are cracked, chipped and peeling at the bottom, allowing a few inches of space where I can see inside, so I think to myself that at least I will be able to see light from a raging fire from the other room, if that were to happen.

Analysis:

SPIDER:  Dream Moods informs me that a spider refers to a powerful force that helps protect me from my own destructive behavior.  In this case, is my husband the protector, since he spotted the spider first?  I like to think so. In real life he certainly reins me in, preventing me from negative excess, whether it be stressing out about trivial things, whining for hours or guzzling gallons of beer.  I mean, don’t get be wrong, I do engage in these activities, frequently, it would just be even more out of control if he weren’t around.   The only thing he doesn’t stop me from is from eating too many nachos.  That we do together, excessively.

NAUTILUS:  No entries for nautilus, but there were entries for squid, which are related, so therefore I figure their interpretations must also be related. Dream Moods tells me that squid could indicate that my judgment is clouded (is it not a good idea to eat an entire tray of nachos, washed down by 5 beers? Is this why I need protection from the spider?)  Dream Force tells me the squid may mean indicate gluttony.  Ah, yes.  My nacho/beerfest.  Guilty.

FIRE:  Way of Tao suggests that fire could be symbolic of transformation and passion, while Dream Force says it could indicate enthusiasm, passion, or anger. Passion appears to be the common theme.  If you know me, you know that if I take on a project, hobby or job, it is because I am passionate about doing it.  I may even become slightly obsessive – restrained only by my husband/protector/spider. This continues to be true until I become fervidly devoted to something new, causing me to drop the old attraction immediately.  This could explain why I haven’t stuck with one job longer than 3 years.  Fickle as I may be when it comes to hobbies or jobs, my devotion has never waivered when it comes to complaining, imbibing beer, or mowing down nachos.