I drank tea with valerian root before bed. That must have been what stimulated the dreams. I was telling my friends about an experience I’d had earlier in my life. I told them, honestly, I could not remember whether it had actually happened or if it was just a dream. Now that I am awake, thinking about it, I am sure that it was a dream, an older dream to which I was referring in this more recent dream. I’ve heard that we cannot always distinguish our dreams from our lived experiences. After ample time, they are all vague memories, just the same. This dream, the older one, I had not once recalled in my waking life until now, as I recall it only because it was first recalled by my dream self.