Coen Brothers

Sheriff Bell's dreams at the end of No Country for Old Men sum up his feeling about what has happened. The first dream is about how his father gave him something and he lost it. This can be interpreted in many ways. In psychology we learned that dreams of losing something usually mean thoughts of failure so it is possible that he feels that he has failed his father in not being able to stop Chigur from continuing his rampage after the money. At the beginning of the film he talks of how he believes that his father was proud of him when he became a sheriff at the same time, but his father died before he retired and now retiring is in his mind sort of him quiting before his job is done. The second dream where his father rides past him going on ahead to start a fire in the middle of a storm. This can mean that his father has passed on before him and left him alone to find his own way through this madness but when he gets there he will be able to find shelter again with his father having set up a fire ahead. And the last words "Then I woke up" can be taken to mean that he never gets there to meet back with his father. Also the use of those words as the last of the movie makes you think that this whole disaster has been like a nightmare for him and now it is over, he is through it and now he has to move on.