I'd like to take a mulligan. You know, a do over.

Our dreams never give up on us, never flit away to another place. We never lose them, but when is it that we lose hope in them? When is it that we redefine them in our head from dream to fantasy? I know that as I have grown older I have become less trusting, more jaded, cynical and unfortunately, less hopeful. We call it growing up, becoming more realistic, or practical. We do what we have to do to survive, to stay comfortable. Most of us never reach our goals, or achieve our dreams. We stop taking the risks that you have to take to get there because we have been hurt, because we've seen others hurt and maybe because we are scared of succeeding almost as much as we are scared of failing. Not trying is not the same as settling, which is actively choosing to accept less than you need. Anyways, no one ever "settles" for their dreams. As if.

When we are kids, we dream so high. Or at least it looks high as we get older and look back on those dreams, after life has attacked those dreams. Clawed at them, torn them down, broken them. When we first dream, they are all attainable, everything is within reach. You can still see that same hope in children, that inability to fear that time will take everything away from us. Or maybe you can even remember it from before you lost it. The question is, can we get it back if we lose it? If yes, than where do we look for it?

For me, I found that hope again in my family and in my friends. The faith they have in me, their belief that I will succeed in anything and everything helps shake the fear off of me. I mean, if everyone thinks that I can do it, that I can make it, than at least we are sharing in the same delusion of grandeur that I am building for myself. I'm not alone with my inability to connect with reality, you are all here with me.

For the moment though, I dream only of a full night of sleep. As this is being posted at 1:51 in the morning, I am obviously going to be disappointed. Oh well. At least I have my stuffed animals and Captain Jack standee.