Just Dreamin'

I read something long ago that has turned out to be very true: there comes a point in middle age when you realize that a great many things you once may have dreamed about will never, ever come to pass. No doubt this happens to all of us but the very highest achievers.

For example, once upon a time, you might have dared to hope that you would someday have a house big enough to have its own well-appointed bar, and wouldn't this look awfully nice in there, with you lounging around in a velvet jacket and slippers and pipe, saying:  Another piña colada, James.

And there may have been a time when you actually believed that you would would one day have the heart to take up piano lessons again, and if you did, wouldn't this be grand to make music on?

And again, you may have somehow longed for some lovely, solid home with an actual fireplace and then wouldn't this room be something nice to come home to and snuggle up in with a cozy book, or dog, or lover?

Although who could possibly keep those white chairs white for long?  Not you, certainly.  So perhaps it is really for the best that these things did not come to pass.  It may be that you would only have made a mess of it, after all.  Had you torn through the iron gates of life, you would perhaps have had only a broken gate to show for it.  Had you dared to eat a peach, you would have dribbled the juice down your shirt front.

And would it have been worth it, after all?

A spilled drink, a broken key, a soiled fabric, a cold draft, a spent flame - reality has that annoying way of intruding on even the cheeriest of dreams.

Well, no matter. Perhaps the kindest thing we can do for ourselves in this mortal life is to dream beautifully. Some say life itself is but a dream.

What do you say?