A Dream about a Mountain, a Coyote and a Hotel

"Had this dream last night. Been thinking about it off and on all day.

Here goes:I'm climbing a tall mountain. I'm only about half way up when beside the trail, a dog -- that looks like a coyote pup overfed to the point of obesity --- jumps out of a yellow shrub, then crosses right in front of me, wearing a pink collar. Studded with either diamonds or sequins.

Immediately after -- time-shift! -- I'm on top of the mountain. In front of me is a ruin. In my dream I'm thinking it's an inn where rich families spent two weeks during the summer. I walk around, trying to figure it out: lobby here, this is a corridor... this must have been the banquet hall is what I'm thinking. A kangaroo with the head of an actress who does TV commercials (at least one for paper towels that runs all the time) hops in front of me and passes by.I'm in the corridor and BEFORE the kanga-woman, it's a ruin. AFTER she passes me,it isn't a ruin anymore, it's the inn restored to its glory days: walls up with fancy paper, even an oil painting of a landscape in a really fussy carved wood frame. Today I'm thinking it was some dream-warped memory of a meeting I had at the Biltmore downtown. That corridor was a lot like the hall that leads to the men's room there.

I recently hiked Echo Mountain (Altadena area) which has a ruin at the top, and have been to the Biltmore which the dream co-opted somehow for the part where kanga-girl hopped by. Why I psychologically recycled this into a dream, I dunno...but I do tend to recycle real-life-stuff into my dreams. Usually they're just fragments tho'; this dream was much much longer and much more linear, like a storyline." - Gary, Los Angeles, CA

Gary, you raise an excellent point; much of the time the images and actions found in our dreams mirror something we've seen or done before. Our daily lives are surely fodder for our nocturnal imaginings, but it's the selection of these feelings and images that create meaningful dreams.

The most common interpretation of a dream in which one climbs a mountain is that the dreamer/climber is overcoming an major obstacle. In your case, you're climbing without any major stress or strain, suggesting that you are comfortably overcoming some sort of issue in your life. It is the next symbol that suggests what that issue might be, as you ascend the mountain, a dog runs across your path.

Dog, as man's best friend, is a close and trusted ally. But this isn't any regular dog, this is a dog who looks like a coyote, who has become fat and is wearing a sparkly collar. Coyotes, in contrast to dogs, are commonly seen as sneaky or untrustworthy adversaries of man. (Personally, I couldn't disagree more, but this is the general reading of the animal as a symbol.) Further, the animal is fat, and like the sequined or bedazzled collar, both of these could indicate an excess of material wealth. This dog is then symbolic of someone who may appear to be a friend in your fight against adversity, but their motivations are based in an interest in financial gain.

As soon as this image of the fat coyote falls before your consciousness, it's replaced. That time shift may be important, as it suggests that once you realize that the truth of this particular person's ulterior motives, a larger goal will be attained.

Once this set of struggles is over, and you find yourself at the top of the mountain, you are confronted with the ruin of a hotel. In your mind, you identify this hotel as a place of former opulence that served as a summer getaway spot for rich people. There's that concern about wealth cropping up again! This brings us to the most interesting symbol your brain has created for the dream, the Kangawoman.

Strange creatures in dreams generally possess special significance. In the instance of a monster that is part one thing and part another, a person can quite easily assume that both the animals comprising the strange creature are important to understanding it's relevance.

Kangaroos are generally thought to either be protective symbols in dream mythology, or aggressive ones. Think of the kangaroo hopping around holding her young in her protective pouch, a la Winnie the Pooh. This image of the kangaroo as a protective mother seems to be most in line with the circumstances of your dream.

Part of what makes me think that this Kangawoman is a maternal figure in your dream is the fact that she has a woman's head. Exact head furthers this argument, as most women who appear in paper towel commericals are playing the role of "Mom" in the commerical.

Now back to the hotel. Hotels are seen as places of transition. A hotel can connote a loss of identity, or a need to escape from your daily reality. It can also be a signal to abandon your old ways of thinking and to re-gear your mind.

So, in the end, this dream can be one that leads to a string of questions only you can answer. Who is your overfed coyote pup? Have you been waiting for a Kangawoman to help you rebuild yourself, or to help you change the way you think? What happened to your hotel in the first place?

I hope this interpertation of your dream is helpful! Thank you for taking the time to send it to me! If you'd like your dream read, please email it to dream.reader@hotmail.com !