Dream: Collecting Passionflowers

Dream 20030715, 5:00 AM:

I am at an area of woods beside a road. There is a ditch, and on the other side of it are bushes and passionflower vines. There are several people here, and it seems like there’s some sort of competition to collect the passionflowers. I start pulling on a vine, trying to follow it back to its roots so I can dig it up. As I’m doing so, I’m explaining to someone that it’s a race to see who gets the most parts between the roots and the leaves – getting the root is very important. I’m pulling the vine along, and it’s like untangling a garden hose. The vine has no leaves, and looks like it’s been under ground; it’s dirty and brown like a big underground stem. Finally I get to the end, and realize that I have the root end in my hand, with lots of little spidery white roots. A man, who reminds me of Farron, says something about “eighteen feet” and holds up a big pair of bolt clippers with which he snips off the vine. It’s not eighteen feet, though – he cuts it off about four feet from the roots. It seems like the vine is doubled, like I’ve got two together.

Then, I’m inside a store talking to a woman who reminds me of Aunt M. I had just seen a candy in a display case that looks like a red and white version of a small passionflower. I tell her about it, but somebody has turned the display case, which is one of those tall ones on a swiveling foot. I try to turn it back, and eventually locate the candy, but it doesn’t look quite the same now.

Then, I’m back outside, and looking around I find a strange passionflower that looks like Passiflora foetida – except that the leaves are lacy and fern-like, like a cardinal climber. I dig up one large and one tiny plant, and I know that I’m getting one of them for someone else.

*end*