Dream of walking along paths on a snowy marsh and into the sea. Told at online event for members of the International Society for the Study of Surrealism, 18th February 2022.

I walk out of woods and onto a bay with a snow-covered marsh that leads to the sea. The sea has stones under it. Along the paths there are some footsteps but no-one is around. My wife is present but unseen. The snow is knee high, I am wearing shorts or swimming trunks, as if it was the Summer. I then see clothing and underclothes strewn on the ground, there are frilly brassieres and Ugg boots, as if some young people had discarded them to go into the water. I am fleetingly bemused by this, thinking that they must be cold in this weather. But I also wonder that when I go into the water maybe it will not be as cold as the marshy surroundings. As I step into the water I wake up. However, at this point or earlier, I was on my way to a ferry and my wife and I had to stay overnight in a hotel so as to catch the ferry the next day. I was hoping that we had reserved a room, but my wife and I agreed that we could always sleep in the hotel or ferry lounge if not.

 
In the discussion the dream-sharer said that the dream was related to ageing, and also nostalgia as he had known ferry areas next to the sea like this when younger.
 
Julia composed the painting using an area in italics at the right to depict part of the sea. This paragraph, where the dreamer and his wife are represented in the sea, begins:
Here is a man’s dream
 
To make the footprints Julia combined pairs of words across the bottom of the composition.
The dream
The woman
Stood
 
And in the same section:
An allusion to a woman
On the snowy marsh the two-word footprint combinations say:
The dream
Her husband
Will she
In dreams
 
A bra drawn in the corner of a paragraph has the word ‘latent’ in the strap and next to it the footprint reads ‘dream content’ and the other strap reads ‘time’ with the footprint ‘to her’ next to it. Similarly, one of the Ugg boots, which has made some of the footprints, is also made of two-word combinations and has on its sole:
the girl

In a pink pair of lacy pants on the beach are the words:
lady smiled
With her
 
And on the vague figure of the dreamer’s wife, to the right of the man, are the words:
with
a woman
She is the wife of
The man who is dreaming.
 
Above the two figures, near the horizon of the sea, is the word ‘fifteen’, the age of the dreamer’s child, briefly mentioned in the discussion. It is compositionally linked to the ferry boat on the horizon at the top of the right page, which is made up of two lines:
her bed
with a warning
These were highlighted because in the discussion the dreamer couldn’t remember if he and his wife had booked a room at the hotel and thought they might have to sleep in the hotel or ferry lounge.