In episode 18 we have a dream inside a dream. Let me explain.

Long ago I was trying to do OOBB ( out of body experience ). With a lot of meditation and strange sounds on my headphones. Side effects was a real conscious dreams. A few times i couldn't wake up. I had a loop, endless dream, when I thought that I woke up but not. It was exactly same as we see in episode 18. Richard woke up, but he only thinks that he did, he still thinks he is Cooper and that is normal. I had the same. When you have a dream in a dream, after a while of "weaking up" a lot of things doesn't fit what you expected. After that you wake up again in a dream. Here the last crucial thing that Richard realised, was the wrong year. Laura scream and the dream ended, new one started. My point is. When I thought I woke up, I was still in a dream and I was doings things that normally don't. So here we go with Cooper:

He woke up and don't know Richard and Linda. He still belive to be Cooper as normal thing. But after driving nowhere he react to Judy's. Why he asking about another weitress ? Because new dream is more connected to reality. Thats the place where Linda works. He drive to her house but didn't find what he expect. We see suprise that door open Laura. How can be this suprise logical if this is not a dream ? If he have a plan to take Laura to Twin Peaks, he shouldn't be suprised seeing her. Because there is no a plan. This is a dream without any logic or plans. Just things happens. Who is on the couch ? It is he Richard. Because he expected here Linda and in their relationship is something wrong, so she killed him or Sara killed him, he looks at white horse. In the end he realised that he is in other times. This is future. When they go to bed with Diane there is different year than he woke up. It is right year. After Laura scream he deffinitly wake up again, still inside a dream. He is sitting on the chair and Laura is speaking something new to his ear. Maybye new clues how to go out.

Ok so who is Richard and Linda ? Richard is a dreamer, Linda is his wife. Thats why we have show this owl ring. The symbol of the ring changed to infinity by Phillip. The owls are not what they seem. Its not a owl, it is infinity horrible married. In FWWM we got "With this ring I thee wed." and we see two terrible persons. They definitely don't represent the characteristics of a good marriage. All we got from Bob and Mike is terrible and poisonous for married. It is Richard nightmare, because something is wrong beetwen Richard and Linda in real life. In his dream he created himself as pure good Dale Cooper and later a pure evil Mr. C. After crossing 430 miles everything changed close to reality. We see fiction, which is a love between Dale and Diane. Everyone must agree that this love is from nothing. We didn't see any signs before from Dale to be in love to Diane. Whats more we see Annie, whos he was in love, not Diane. So it's a completly dream where he desires to be in love with Linda/Diane, but reality is different. After crossing 430 mile reality come close, we see Richard who is something between good Coop and bad Coop. He is between two worlds 🙂 But his attitude towards Diane is cold. There is no love anymore, love was a fiction. Now is reallity, but it's reallity in a dream not a real life. But if it is a dream, another time someone else can represent his wife. It is not permanently established that Diane is Linda. It is only for a moment of time in a long dream. It can be Laura another time, when he try to save her from evil. This one probably shows us Naido, it is her wife without a face. So everyone can be Naido. And there is going Mr C. pure evil Cooper, that probably wants just kill his wife.

Good Coop is in love to Annie, because it's Richard desire to experience a love. We had in old seasons a soap opera INVITATION TO LOVE ! Why in Richard dream, everyone is watching something like this. With so obvious name. Then Dale
fall in love to Annie. In new season Annie is gone, noone is mention her. Now he loves Diane. Because it's all dreams. Normally behavior can't be like this. He completly don't care what happened to Annie. Now, we have a guy name Fireman who was before a Giant 🙂 Different persons, looks the same, and both try to help Coop. It is possible only in dream. We all the time have that comming from Lynch, he tell this to us. As Phillip first time, as Gordon Cole, and at the end as same Coop. Big head of Coop on background says "we live inside a dream" that happens after looking at clock. It is a trigger, like at the end of season with the year. He realised that this is impossible to be true what he is seing.

Next thing, nuclear explosion. A lot of people is frithening nuclear war as end of our times. So it's nothing special that in a dream, dreamer see this as something bad and evil. It is simple explanation in dream. So that the dreamer connect all the evil to the thing he is scare off. From this evil the worm goes to the mouth. If we accept for a moment this Linda = Laura. We get something like this, a evil is comming inside mother-in-law. That can explain to a dreamer why his wife is so bad. Noone likes mother-in-law 🙂 Maybye Richard think in a dream like this: if I rescue Laura from Sara, my wife will be better.

Next is Judy. It's a place where his wife works and a name of pure evil in dream. So another thing that he belive in his dream made his poisonous relationship. In a dream it's a pure evil that destroys eveything. In reality it's a place where Linda works. So maybye they relationship is destroyed by her work.

So what can Laura say to Cooper at the end ? Maybye this "You are not an FBI agent, just an ordinary man. Living in a toxic relationship, your marriage is falling apart." 🙂