Back in the early 90’s, I was on a camping trip in Vermont. Even though it was late June, they had a serious cold spell and the temperatures dropped overnight into the mid-twenties.
I went to sleep that night with all my clothes piled on my sleeping bag for extra warmth. I was freezing and I didn’t think I would get any sleep at all. The next thing I remembered was waking up in my bed at home, intuitively I knew that I didn’t belong there but I wasn’t sure what was going on just yet. My body was a little achy from sleeping too long, that’s the sort of detail I don’t usually experience in dreams, so I felt that this was a waking experience.
I could hear my mother mopping the floors in the upstairs hallway, and I could smell the scent of pine cleaner drifting into the room. I got out of bed and my Shih-tzu was there, wagging his tail and looking for attention. He had been paraplegic since the late 80’s, but here he was in front of me with all four legs working normally. I remembered going to sleep in Vermont and kept saying to myself that I “don’t belong here.”
I spoke with my Mom briefly, she said something that clued me in on the exact time frame, it was seven years in the past. I didn’t want to be there, so I decided to lay back down on my bed again and try to sleep. Almost instantly I woke up, shivering cold in my sleeping bag in Vermont again.