Just a Dreamer

My son has been asking me A LOT about what I dreamed about being, when I was a kid, when I grew up… In his mind, it’s a pretty simple question. What did you want to be when you were five? What did you want to be when you were six? What did you want to be when you were seven?

My memories don’t work quite that precisely, of course. So we’ve talked a lot about the things I specifically remember wanting to be when I was young (teacher, pig farmer, president, writer) and we’ve talked a lot about the things he wants to be (inventor or all kinds of things, but especially computer games and maybe he’d like to own his own computer game store). As we talk, I start to remember other dreams I had, as well. When my dad was building on an addition, I remember sorting through the wood scraps and hammering in nails and thinking that I would like to grow up and build things. My mom and I once stopped at a Native American burial ground that had been unearthed near Manhattan. For a long time after that, I dreamed about being an archeologist.

My son and I have talked a lot about the experiences that shape our dreams and I have thought a lot about the things that change them. I was in junior high when I started thinking about being a psychologist. I spent a summer in high school volunteering at a large state institution in Beatrice, Nebraska. That was probably when I began truly forming a vision of what I thought I might be, contemplating what I would contribute to the world and what I might take away from it.

By my late teens, I had a fairly solid sense of what I wanted to be… and twenty years later I am none of those things. Not really. I always imagined that I would be a writer – weaving words in and around the fabulous things that were happening in my life, recording my experiences to share with the word. I suppose, in that sense, I am exactly what I planned… I just never really imagined the details in this order.

That’s the beauty of dreaming, I think. You can follow visions and desires without really understanding how the practicalities will turn out. I told my son I’m not done growing up. I still have dreams about what I want to be and I imagine I’ll be following those dreams for years to come. There’s really no reason for it to end, right? There doesn’t have to be a point in the road where you say, “I’ve gotten here. I’m done.”

Or maybe there is that place down the road, but I’m too far away to see it yet. One thing I do remember about being a kid was thinking that all the wondering would stop. Some day I’d know. Some day I’d understand. Some day I wouldn’t have to dream about how I’d live my life because I’d be there doing it.

Now I know that dreaming is the fun part. Living it is good too, but without the dreams, the life wouldn’t be nearly as colorful.