Sleep. Dream. Wonder. Repeat.

They say you are never too old to dream.  And while one continues to dream, of course completely ignoring the fact most of the dreams never get realized or get delayed , the problem happens when you get recurring dreams at my age. Which is almost 68.

At the outset let me clarify, that while P V. Sindhu and Saina Nehwal have nothing to fear from me, I was a decent badminton player in my younger days when I represented my school and college,  and even participated and won in the men's doubles final (there were no womens events, so partnered my husband )  and won, at the Institute where I went to live after marriage.

So I was a bit surprised when I had a dream where I was on a badminton court, and was trying to serve. For some unknown reason (which remains a puzzle to this day) , whenever I tried to serve, the racquet would completely miss the shuttlecock, and the latter would fall to the ground.  I would continue trying, to the disgust of the person on the other side (the dream didn't specify who it was) . By and by, I would get traumatised, worried and leave the court in a state of worry.

The interesting thing was that this dream repeated itself several times.  You might think that I would finally serve, with all those trials, but , NO.  The racquet and the shuttlecock never met. Then one day the dream extended to me returning a serve . Everything below the waist, never connected.  Anything that was tossed above, I ended up hitting in a sort of feeble way ; something very upsetting to someone was earlier very good with  forehand and backhand tosses and returns.

I am just wondering what these repetitive badminton dreams mean. I mean why not a sport where I might be a beginner , like tennis or squash, or kho kho or kabaddi or whatever.

Another recurring dream I have had has nothing  to do with sport. 

You see my mother passed away 17 years ago, in a rather sudden fashion.And I was with her in her last moments.  One has come to terms with the loss of parents by now and learned to live without their presence,  except possibly, in spirit, during  important life events.

I keep having this dream, where I am expecting lots of folks to come by for some function, and am trying to figure out the logistics. I decide that my folks would be using the bedroom opposite .  I then wake up from the dream,  don't see my Mom,   see my daughter go into that room to fetch something, and wonder what she is doing there.   It takes a while to realize that my mother is not going to come and use that room when she stays with me.  End of dream.  

But, this dream has re-occurred many many times. 

I have failed to understand the significance of these two dreams, which have occurred many times.

I wonder if these are snatches of some old memories stored somewhere in my brain.  I wonder if something accesses these memories now when I sleep, and wonder what that "something" is.

I have also heard , and seen it happen (in my fathers's case and an aunt-in-law's case), that folks start remembering old childhood events and people, when  a life change is imminent.

I have an academic interest in all this as I have great respect for the way the brain functions, and the fact that each brain is unique.

Normally, one doesn't take dreams seriously.  Most of them are fun dreams, and some are even impossible.

But I wonder why I get the above dreams repeatedly.

And am seriously looking for answers . Experts ?