It must be a sure sign of getting old. I am now dreaming of Emily Bishop/Eileen Derbyshire from Coronation Street. I woke up this morning and immediately told Mrs FJH…who was remarkably unconcerned that I was dreaming of a TV superstar. “Thats nice darlin’……..write about it on that Blog thing you do. Tell Slugger O’Toole”.

In the dream….since you ask….I was at our local village post office and exchanged some pleasantries with Emily/Eileen in the queue. When I got to the counter I said to the clerk “I didnt know that Eileen Derbyshire lived in the village”. And the post office clerk….”oh she has lived here for years”. Hmmm……I think in some way this dream might have been sparked by a conversation I had a few weeks ago with Mrs FJH. We have lived in this village nineteen years and know by name (first and last) just nineteen people….and several are them are from the same family. We are essentially people who “keep to ourselves”.

Yet it strikes me that in retirement the nature of my dreams has changed. I have obviously no work related anxiety so I simply dont have dreams about people I used to work with. Dreams often feature…(sadly deceased in many cases) family members….and perhaps oddly battlefields of the world.

Yet I wonder do we all dream of celebrity? I often dream of the Manchester United team of the 1960s ….but it strikes me that dreaming of a celebrity is actually some kinda weird intrusion into THEIR privacy.

Somewhere in leafy Cheshire, Eillen Derbyshire is not waking up and saying “I dreamt about FitzjamesHorse last night”. Indeed I suppose thats a sign that you are famous…..complete strangers dream about you.

I find Dreams interesting. I am often woken up by the cat from a dream that is the greatest story never told…….and think I should write this down as I will win an Oscar for best screenplay. But by the time I have fed FitzjamesCat, I cant remember the dream. I rarely remember dreams.

I think not remembering dreams might be related to the fact that my late mother and my wife both told or tell me that they could interpret dreams. The problem is that “interpreting” dreams seems to merely involve telling me “oooooooh thats very bad sign”. So if I dream about rabbits, Suzi Quatro, football, rain, Mongolia……it doesnt really matter…..its a “very bad sign”.

But dreams fascinate me because they seem to have a logic all of their own. For example I often dream about Queens University Belfast but somehow the PFC lecture theatres are all underground…….and geographically QUB has “moved” to a non existent building at the corner of Lisburn Road/Sandy Row/University Road.

Likewise when I dream about an airport…..any airport….it seems like a giant branch of WH Smith. And airplanes seem like a flying bus made by Fisher Price. And for some reason every dream I have had about watching Manchester United seems to have me peeping over the balcony of a church rather than being in a massive football stadium.

And Geography seems different. I “know” I am in New York when I walk out of the airport on one side of a narrow street and walk into Macys …..actually looking like a 1960s Woolworths store. I “know” I am inDublin becaus the southern quays to the west of O’Connell Bridge is actually a covered arcade with small kiosks like 1960s Smithfield in Belfast. I “know” I am in Central London when I am at a junction that bears a remarkable similarity to North Street/Royal Avenue in Belfast…..although most London dreams seem to involve trains or non specific underground stations.

Dreams are like a bizarre alternative universe with their own ….consistency. Does it follow that the less active, more house-bound that I am……my dream horizons will be more restricted?