Dreams

Do you remember them?

I do. The ideals of one still naive to the bigger plans, the bigger picture. Fate, karma, all those mysterious forces acting at once to nudge, to shove your helpless self to a path paved with reality.

Those dreams. The lights, the stage, the drama. Now there are lights...stages and drama of a different kind, where ordinary life plays itself out, in its 550,000 hours.

Thus ends the dream. No longer walking on tiptoe out of sheer habit. A body lithe with raw energy now tired and settled, and a dancer once who dances, now, for herself alone.

And so, with reality's path come reality's laws. Oh how the biological clock ticks... The expectation to settle, to settle down, and to dream settled dreams. And settle we have. Settled to a life where our expectations exceed our realities, with potent words thinly veiled, framed in delicate sentencing. How I miss the honeyed glaze from early days.

She asked herself, once, if she still believed in Prince Charming. Her answer stopped in her throat, as though a hand clasped tight around it. How desperately did she want to say yes...

But alas, the clock ticked its tock, and dreams remained dreams forever more.