Lesson Learned

Practiced wants become desires; practiced desires become visions that can linger for months or years.  Such visionary fantasies can be persistent even when built on the shifting sands of what-ifs and if-onlys when real life doesn’t match up.

It’s possible for a long-standing vision’s cork to suddenly pop, for it to erupt into the realm of possibility with celebratory fizz.  Flags flutter and fireworks explode overhead. Woohoo!  Could it be?  Really?

Then cold, hard reality sinks in.  The vision-turned-possibility takes money to become an actuality.  More money than long ago when it first seemed attractive.  Much more.  So much money that acquisition would be foolish to even consider.

This was what happened to me today.  The surprise party was raided (and the figurative champagne confiscated) almost as soon as it began.

I’ve been pondering my reaction, remembering something my mother-in-law said years ago.  She was a woman of fine taste who appreciated quality possessions and experiences.  “Getting isn’t the big deal.  Wanting and hoping are, because dreaming is always the best part.”

And so I tell myself to keep dreaming – that it is the best part because I am already content with who I am, what I have, and the life I’m living.  In that case, I’m truly free to dream for the sake of dreaming, without the sting of disappointment.