I very often dream of my parents who have been deceased for over 50 years. I am always making an attempt to go home to see them, but I can never find a telephone number to call them.

This causes me lots of anxiety and I wonder what the connection might be to the present day. In my dreams I will always wind up in tears because I cannot contact them.

--John, Age 78, Married, Lilburn, GA, USA

Hi John -

Welcome to the classic, “can’t connect” anxiety dream. Your tears show just how real your feelings of frustration are.

Dreams are peculiar animals - and as we all know - we can get confused in them. In your waking life, you have known for fifty years that your parents have passed on - and that picking up a phone to give them a call, no matter how much you might like to, is impossible.

As soon as we begin dreaming, though, all the rules change. Soon we are in a frenzy trying to find the right number to dial. We can look in book after book to no avail. Perhaps we find a phone directory only to discover that the pages are torn from it. If we ever do find the right number, perhaps we keep getting disconnected. Maybe we never even get a dial tone. It’s a crazy progression of behavior, but in our dreams it all seems to make sense.

The answer to this riddle of “dream logic” is that dreams speak in metaphors. The phone represents contact. The inability to find the number indicates frustration. The tears? They don’t need an explanation.

You were a young man when your parents passed on. I am sure you have missed them a great deal over these last fifty years. There were so many important events in your life that they never were able to see, or share, with you.

Your dreams show you miss your parents very much. What’s the bigger message? All the days are precious. It’s over much too soon.