My imagination is big, it fuels my creativity, my writing, my life.

Today I reflect on my dreams. What they were long ago, the ones that have come true and the ones that faded away.

As a romantic and a reader, I had a dream when I was younger. A dream I suspect many of us have.

As an adolescent that dream seemed unattainable, like it would never happen to me, but I didn’t let it go.

What do you do with a dream in your heart that you wish to come true? In my case, I believed in my dream. Of course, I stumbled and had to take risks. Of course, it didn’t happen right away and of course I had to believe I deserved my dream.

Want to know what my dream was? Come on, if you know me even a little you know what it was.

It was to find love. Not the kind of love where you settle, not the kind that you question. The kind of love that consumes you, the kind that takes your breath away and the kind that you feel empty without it. Passionate, understanding, honest, real love. A love that makes you whole.  

All those stories with their happy endings coupled with my imagination inspired my dream. I always say, books were my saving grace.

As I reflect on my dream and what it has given me I am overwhelmed with emotion. You see, my dream came true and it is so much bigger than I could have ever thought. When I dreamt it, I couldn’t grasp everything it would encompass, it has been something beyond imagining.

When I close my eyes, I see a younger me, laying on top of a faded second-hand quilt on a twin bed. I’m scribbling in a diary about life and acceptance, about confusing, unimaginable events and about hopes and dreams. I can hear the pen scratching from one side of the paper to the other as I pour out every thought in my head. I see the page dampen and swell from dropped tears and yet I continue until it’s all there, filling several pages. I see this younger me who is lost and scared, who is trying to keep everything together for everyone else and somehow keep it together herself. I can also see her light. It’s been dimmed but I know she will find a way to make it shine. She has determination and a dream.

I believe life requires dreams. Dreams give us hope that inspire us to keep going. First, we have to believe in them and secondly, we have to realize we deserve them.

My dream; this love I have, is beautiful. It is big gestures and small, it is solid and complete, it has given me strength and happiness. So, in ending I want to encourage you to keep dreaming and to chase those dreams, you deserve them.