Ready, set, dream

Kids nowadays don't have a chance to daydream.  They always have an iPhone or a smartphone or some other electronic device attached to their hands. 

Free-floating ideas don't have a chance.  And free thought is where great ideas come from.  Do you think Copernicus would be a household word if he'd had a laptop?  Or that Einstein would have made a dent in our collective consciousness if he had had access to an Android?  Or that Edison would have brought light into our lives if he knew about texting?

When I was young, I would lie in the grass on the shady side of the house and watch the sky.  It seems there were always clouds to figure out.  And most of the time I would sing at the top of my voice, just lie there and sing, for the sheer fun of it.  Of course, once when I was indulging in song a bug flew into my mouth.  But for the most part it was fun and I daydreamed. 

You don't hear phrases like 'stop and think' anymore either.  No one stops to think.  If the answer isn't available on the internet, we stop asking the question.  You also don't hear of anyone wondering about stuff.  The answers are at our fingertips.

First husband talks to himself all the time.  No matter where he is, he'll have a conversation about whatever is bugging him.  This is how he works things out in his mind.  He mumbles (and thinks I have a hearing problem because I always have to say, 'are you talking to me?')  I long ago gave up on that part of him.  That's just who he is.  He marches to his own beat.  But I digress.

We need to be able to daydream, to wonder, to confide our fears and hopes to another living being.  I had a friend once who told her little Shih-Tzu everything that bothered her; he was really good at not telling her secrets.  When he died she almost died too; she didn't know who she would talk to.  So, after a little while she got another Shih-Tzu.  We have to have someone.

I think daydreaming - or 'wool-gathering', as my mother used to say -  is a form of prayer.  People tell us we aren't allowed to pray when or where we want, but there's no law against daydreaming.  We can confide our fears and hopes to the Spirit in the Sky - to quote an old Norman Greenbaum song.  Try to convince your kids to just go outside and think it over.  It will seem weird to them at first, but if they keep at it they might get the hang of it, and maybe even enjoy it.

Ready, set, dream.