I had a dream

No, I really did. And it was a trip. Full moon night, I think this past Monday...
Of course, at first I couldn't sleep at all. I'd been running all blooming day, taking care of errands,  family, sitting with a friend while his wife was in surgeryin, dinner to their home,  back to my home to handle some drama that was happening here with the young woman who's been living here since spring when her family kicked her out, then back out before doing yard work, etc etc etc. I sat outside for awhile, quite late, watching for the lovely moon to break through the clouds, listening to the life in the pond, relaxing into the night air. I finally went in, up to my room, in my chair by the window, wrote for awhile, music playing...
Why mention all that? Background.
I fell asleep for a smidge, woke up to call a friend and wIsh them luck on a big presentation and make sure they were awake, and fell into this:

I was in a simple, very hip, boho chic apartment, one of those in an old converted house. It was supposed to belong to my sister, but there's no way. Beside the point...my sister, daughters, friend of younger daughter and a still unknown person. Door knock, my mum is there.  Consciously I'm thinking "Yay!! Mum dream! Yesssss!" She and I go out for a walk, to chat and catch up,  and to just be together. The road we're walking along is old, it's along a meadow...in fact, I know the road. It's in Ashford, I've been on it many many times. We're walking along when I hear what sounds like rapid fire gunshots. I look around to see if I can spot anyone, hurrying mum along to a grouping of trees, keeping her on the far side of me so that I can body block and protect her while helicopters flew overhead, obviously looking for something.  Once we got to the trees I looked again and saw a tiger running toward us, growling. I'm thinking, Oh shit, and started to move mum back to the apartment.
I kept her on the land side of the road, just as I had with the other threat. She was moving more slowly and I remember, again consciously, thinking what a bummer it was, I had been looking so forward to finding out what she'd been up to and asking for her advice on a few big things going on. But I needed to get her away from the tiger, which was bearing down on us. I had my gun with me, cocked and ready but waiting until the absolute last second of encounter. I didn't want to kill the tiger and I felt that I could somehow move mum back to safety in time, but if I needed a shot I was going to wait until it's face was right in mine and hit the heart straight on. I had it all thought out, but it was more instinctive than planned.
We passed a family that was out walking, younger (duh. most days I feel like the world is younger). I told them to go back, go back go back. The parents laughed at me, the young father called me a crazy bitch. I pleaded with them as I went past, but kept moving at the fast clip we had attained. I heard the tiger hit them. Heard their screams of terror. Heard the attack.
Kept moving.
I did not look back and I wouldn't let mum. I put her in front of me and pushed. The tiger didn't want to stay there, it just took what was there but was not stopping. I could see the house ahead and knew we would make it if we kept moving.
Old stone steps, crooked but clear. Up the hill. To the door. Big old wooden door, shoved it open, mum through, pushed it shut with my back and braced against it while i locked it.
Safe.
Except...
There was a strange old man that hadn't been there before, standing to the left beside a podium. A door to the immediate left of me, before podium, a hallway running the lower floor to the right, 2 doors ahead along it on the right, another door to the left, just behind the podium, at the base of the staircase that ran along the left of the hall wall. Old house, wallpaper, good condition but stained with life. Carpet on stairs. I needed to get her up the stairs and into the apartment again, she wasn't safe until I had. Everyone else was still there.
The old man was snarking and grumbling about something but didn't make a move to bother me and I acknowledged his existence but no more than that. As i passed by him I saw that there was a large wooden raven statue sitting on top of the podium and I thought, "oh, how very Poe", and admired the work on it. As mum was almost to the top of the stairs, the door just ahead to the left , I looked back down the stairs at the raven and watched as it became animated and hopped off of the podium onto the floor, on top of an extremely large rat that had materialized. The raven began to mutilate and shred the rat. Not eating, just destroying. It then looked at the man, who began to natter at it like a grumpy old city fella.
Got mum into the apartment, shut the door and leaning back against it, took head count, breathing and thinking, really, for the first time. My first thought was WHAT THE FUCK.
Then I noticed that while my girls were there, my sister, who wasn't, was there, mum, and the still unidentified person, younger daughter's friend was not.
WHERE THE HELL IS SHE??? I demanded.
She was worried about me, I was told, and had gone after me when the energy had gotten all wierd.
Holy hell.
She was out in that mess.
Stay here, I told the rest. And I had my "stop the horse in the dead run right in front of me" voice on and I knew that they wouldn't mess with that directive at all.
I went back out the door. Stopped in the upper hall to look and think, to listen and feel and try to determine where she could be. There wasn't going to be much room for error so I had to be intelligent and move quickly.
Downstairs.
As I was going downstairs, the raven became a large pit mix looking dog, white with patches. Snarling. Angry at the man, who was yelling more loudly. He looked at me, hollered at the dog, who turned and charged him. Man ran into the room that he'd been standing by and the dog followed. I could hear noises of a struggle and screams, but that wasn't my concern right now. It did disturb me that I could compartmentalize that well, but right then I realized that I had warned him to stop being so negative or it'd bite him. Well, it was. Biting him.
I stopped at the foot of the stairs, knew I had to go left further into the house. I was clearly aware that she had not left the building at that point and was grateful. I took a moment to glance right toward the door and was startled to see the dog standing right there, large, almost in my face, staring straight into my eyes. Well, shit. Now what? I waited, no thought of running or panic, knowing that I had to wait until dog made a move so that I would know which tact to take. A momentary eternity, dog wagged and dog smiled, then ran back into the room where it had chased the old man. I breathed and turned left again, just to see young girl standing there, terrified, holding her arm, which was slashed and hemorraging.
I ran to her, knowing that I had enough arm and hand strength from working at the farm to cut off her blood flow or at least severely diminish it. I grabbed the laceration with one had and her upper arm with the other, squeezing tight as I raised it high above her head, told her she'd be okay, and loudly said
"I'M DONE. WAKE ME THE FUCK UP. NOW!"
And I did.
That dream freaking disturbed me all damn day. What the hell???
But like all things that bother me, I knew I had to pick it apart and look at the pieces to see what it was about.
At the end of the day, I had come to several conclusions. The most important are these:
While the dream itself was horrible, the key points were that at no time during the events did I feel panic or fear for my personal safety. I body blocked, I was more than willing to confront and accept whatever was necessary to meet my objective, which was clearly the safety of those entrusted to me. Whether that entrusting was from an outside source or from they themselves. At no time, also, did I fear that I would not be able to keep them safe.
At no time did the animals pose a threat to me personally.
That's a very fast, very nutshell drop here. I have to go to work but I've been trying to get this draft done for awhile now.
I'll be back with some other observations and conclusions.
And the rest of the story. Of what happened in the day that followed the dream and why it was significant.
Life.
It's on my bucket list.