Dreams and I don't get along. A dream is something one considers thoughtfully, often in repose, and sometimes in retreat. Held by at least one person, it can be pursued or held as an ideal.
I am not a dreamer. Early on in my childhood I realized that I was so caught up in daydreaming the whatifs of the social school hierarchy, that I was missing out on getting involved. It has taken me years to really get involved. Years without dreaming. My basic principle has been instead to do what I want everytime I want it. Easy. And no dreams built up. My sex life used to be like this. I would crawl into the guy's head, and find out wht he enjoyed. I liked variety and this complimented the male sex persona very well, what with me being hetero for some reason. I have no sex fantasies because thehonest truth is that I've tried out every thing that I might have wondered about - that I did wonder about.
There is nothing so revealing as an achieved dream. In every case, the reality has introduced me to the details my fantasy life could not or did not pursue. Carnegie Mellon - the intelligence fantasy come true - showed me incredible people with clear and bright minds. People who were happy, competent, busy, and just plain people in other ways. The reality was of living in a perfume bottle - fragrant, original, unusual, expensive. Living in the confines of the communication communities of the highly educated, socially inept (usually). Glass walls.And a beautifuly sculptured stopper, easy to remove to let a gentle and delicate drop of perfume out. No impurities. Glass floor and ceiling.
My sex fantasies led me to believe more in Peter's stories about Carlos Castenada. Of the losing of one's core energies through the sexual experience. Celebacy strikes me more and more as a respectful manner to interact with the universe in. There was a charming and well thoguhtout article in the Utne Reader this past month writtten by a woman about the strengths and virtues one can attain through a pure desire towards celebacy. Althouh her strain ran to a religious position, I respected her presentation of this decision. She demonstrated that such a decision can more than benefit a person through removing the social short cut of sexual flirtation - the dance of the sexes. Alternately developed skills of conversation and interrelating were in her eyes some of the results one can achieve. Perhaps this is a dream now of mine. As my goals run towards social competence acquisition, I suspect as much. :)
Weave in to the story of dreams my ability to look into the heart of another. I've refined this, epicycling to an artform. I can see other's dreams. I thought I was looking into what they wanted, but my scope was too broad and I included more elusive long-term destinations too, I think.
Miau
There I am, staring into their hope. An epicycle of thought later, I can see avenues that would take that person througha casual and causal stroll to that hope. A dream made out of reality. The ultimate real estate - utopia. Solid and bound to the person's own view of its nature.
Such has been my life. I have no dreams left - only hope and strength. I have goals and destinations in mind. But I lack doubt about my achieving them. I know I will. For me, an ex-nihilist, a person who spent the weekend on a 72 hour observation pass in a mental hospital for insisting society was not worth it, an anarchist through and through, for this person to have become the person I am now, strong, forceful, demanding, successful, connected, powerful, and strangely no more happy than before, is an indication that anything is possible. People ten years ago would not have predicted this. People 20 years ago did, but they did not see.
Perhaps my dreams were less than demanding? Going to Oxford or Cambridge for a PhD. My step into Carengie Mellon was halfway there. I could have and may still continue someday, but I know what that dream looks like to the end. I know the results in the professors from there that I worked with. My desire to be the most beautiful woman inthe world has also been closely achieved. I learned - strangely enough that this sort of goal was foolish except in so far as being attractive to others in many ways is an incredible advantage. .. intellignce, beauty, what else? Not much. Those were my dreams. The combination is so unusual that even now I get a kick out it.
I get a kick out of sitting ina meeting interviewing people, and watching them tret Richard and I differently, and then handing my business card over. My status changes from "Richard's partner" as I am usually introduced by him to "President" in one second. The concurrent look of regret on the face of most interview candidate's is amazing. The look signifies the results of a private test I run - are they able to recognize what is happening int he situation or not. Richard looks tobe the hyper competent brilliant guy with PhD, and I am brought in as an observer to meet the candidate later without revelaing my strengths. I simply do not show them at all, that is unless one is looking for them behind the clothes and the lipstick. And then wack. That title takes them out. Why would this hyper competent guy have me as president?! Heh. Truly fun. I enjoy meeting the people who do not go through this little ritual - and even more, the ones who know how to manage their own reactions through it with grace.
Dreams.. I take dreams and make reality into them in the future. I should dream wisel.