Dreamin'

I like reading Real Simple magazine, which I still think of as "Martha Stewartless Living". It's well written, well designed, and frequently has articles that make me stop and think...though not the ones about how to pick the perfect bra, get the best nail color, or ....well, you get the idea. But the ones that make me think are worth it, and are in fact why I subscribed to the magazine to begin with. Initially, it was a fund raiser for our daughter, but now it's because we like it.

One section that frequently gets me thinking is their monthly contest where they ask offbeat questions, and you answer to win something. This month, the responses were to answer this: what are your wildest dreams? Reading through them, a number were predictable -- have every pair of Jimmy Choos ever made, walk barefoot in the sand on Fiji, have dinner with Jack Nicholson. (Actually, that last one, I might enjoy, myself. Depends on his ego.) Some of the answers were hard to believe -- not that I thought they were lying, but that I thought 'thats your wildest dream? ' For example, several said that they just wanted their children to grow up as decent people, or to hold their grandchildren. But that got me to thinking. I've never much been persuaded by those articles that say you ought to 'live your dreams', because, for the most part, I've never had dreams. Oh, there have certainly been things I'd like to do, or like to have done, and once in a while -- like when I got to spend three months in Australia -- I've done them. Mostly, though, they fall into the category of things that would be nice, but I'm certainly not going to spend time dreaming about them, because whats the point? Thats where the occasional thoughts about being a professional photographer, or just once being actually, no kidding, well-dressed -- as in, George Clooney in Oceans Eleven well dressed -- without looking like a dork, or being able to get why people like eating fish, or going to the CIA's Baking Boot Camp -- thats where those dreams go. And even those aren't wild. Hard to achieve, you bet. Me, well-dressed? Ah...no. Don't think so.

But it made me wonder: what if dreams really were valuable? What if they really could motivate you, help you steer your life, give you the psychic boost that the people who write those self-help books want you to think they do? If that was true...what would mine be?

Wish I knew. A little, anyway.