When a dream comes true...

I've always felt that dreams can often be a dangerous thing... Don't misunderstand me I think having dreams, aspirations, desires are fantastic... healthy... inspiring, and whatever other good adjective you want to attribute to them.  However it seems that noone ever truly discusses the downside to dreams, the bitter after taste of dreams... 

That after the dream has been had, some action needs to take place.  That one needs to not only hope and pray but take some postive steps to actually materializing those dreams.  Because as much as we like to pretend, dreams are simply hopes unless they are actualized... and hopes, while admirable, are still only the better half of failure.  More importantly, that false hope, like unrealized dreams can be more debilitating than any failure that can be imagined.

Of course, every once in a while dreams do come true... hopes are fulfilled... promises, even those made to yourself, are kept... and wouldn't it be wonderful, poetic even, if that was the end, if that was the climax, if that was the ride into the sunset that brings upon the soft music carrying you into Forever. 

And yet here again is something they don't tell you about dreams... they don't end.

It is an amazing trait of humans that we are never satisfied... that is why we left the cave, that is why we discovered fire, domesticated animals, learned to farm, raise a family.... and learned to dream.

What they don't tell you is that once you have reached one dream, you simply move onto the next.  You celebrate for moment, relax in your own sun's rays, close your eyes, and imagine the next sunrise.  You take pleasure in one dream accomplished only to understand that the next day you have discovered another desire, another ending to dream about, another obstacle to pass.

And daunting as the task is, as impossible as the dream seems you are bolstered, confident even, because in your past and in the past of all things there lay a series of dreams accomplished... and then quickly forgotten.

Be not afraid to Dream, but to Dream and not Act...

Be not afriad to Hope, but to Hope and not Try...

Be not afraid to Fail...

The American Soul, 9/11, and the Falling Dollar....

I can remember immediately after 9/11, even before ther dust settled, everyone was saying that the world was going to change.  I was skeptical of course, because I am a natural skepic, and because rarely, if ever, has any one action "changed the world"... perhaps a serious of actions, all connected changed the world, but rarely has a single event actually changed the world in any considerable manner.  I suppose some could argue that the establishment of the UN changed the world, but that would mean all International Relations funneled through the UN and that is simply not the case, hell not even all International Law is acutally law.  Perhaps some would say that Ghandiji changed the world, but that is more emotional than actual fact.  If Ghandiji had actually changed the world we would see non-violent movements continuously occur, and more importantly continuously work.... they haven't, one only needs to read about social movements in Africa to see that.

However, it is possible that events change a way of thinking for some, some one part of something larger, for one segment.... that is truly what the media and politians meant when they said that 9/11 had changed the world.  9/11 was supposed to wake up the American public, it was supposed to re-invigorate a nation that had been too consumed with commercialism to notice what their capitalist endeavors were doing around the world.  9/11 was supposed to awaken the sleeping political bent of a nation of people to question their leaders, to question their collective morals, to question whether it was more important to pay attention to the next IPO rather than the revolution in Yugoslavia.  Out of the disaster of 9/11 America should have questioned their place in the world, their acitons in the world.... and pehaps more importantly their own actions on a daily basis within our own country.  Sadly, that didn't happen.  Americans after 9/11 continued to spend more time shopping than they did concerning themselves with an over-reaching government.... after 9/11 american CEOs continued to draw massive bonuses for drving their companies in the ground, and the American public continued to spend above their limits for a future that for some reason continued to like one big mall with sales.  Americans bought Xbox360s and Iphones, SUVs that drink gasoline like an under-nourished child, the decade of the yuppies and Hipsters continued to previal..... little changed, little ever does.

However, now it seems as though we may be returning a simpler time, a less commercialized time, and it is not because of some great awakening, some great leader, or some magnificient recognition of the many obstacles facing this nation and the next generation.  The only thing that may be our salvation is the falling dollar.... the falling of the all mighty dollar, the one thing that up until now could make us feel superior when our morals were tossed aside for $3 Million homes on two-acre plots in a gated community, seperated from those who just couldn't do well enough to help themselves.

Perhaps now we will return to a time when clothes are handed down along with bicycles and used cars.  Perhaps now we can return to a time when the pocket is so tight, that people demand answers - answers to questions about property taxes, answers to the benefits of free trade, and answers to questions of starting wars.  Perhaps not patches will be sewen on jeans, coupons will be clipped, parents will work two-shifts to send their kids to college so that they can get the education to buy bigger homes that will only be a part of a "Dream" again, along with the picket fence and dog.  Perhaps we will again strive to make our nation that shining city on top of the hill, rather than filling our coffers with shining things.  Maybe the word 'bling' will be changed with 'altruism'.... Maybe again rappers will boast about their ability to bring a million to the street, rather than a million spent on cars and jewelry.  Perhaps simpler times will bring more in exports than imports, perhaps once again an industry will change its standards to meet the new demands of a more frugal population.

If that occurs, we can thank only one thing, the falling dollar, the beacon of our economic innovation, the signal that a pluralistic nation can survive based on the fundamental belief that a honest days work is more important that the car you drive or the form of God to which you pray.... Perhaps the falling dollar will be a signal a new generation to have some pride in their nation, to work for the betterment of others with the understanding that a nation of people most prosper together, if all in the nation are going to become wealthy at all.

Perhaps.... but I am skeptical of course, because I am a natural skeptic, and because rarely, if ever, has anything changed.   

"When the fall is all that is left, it matters a great deal..."