Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Dream a Little Dream of Forever

This post is the third in a series leading up to our anniversary on Sunday. Click here to go directly to the first post in the series.



I love to dream with my beloved.

From the time we were dating, we have built castles in the air. Sitting on an old sofa on the screened front porch of my off-campus rental house, toes touching in the middle as we faced one another from each end, we talked earnestly about all the fun things our future life could hold.

In thirteen years, we have pursued some dreams, released others, stored some for later, and birthed new ones.

We followed our dreams to California and spent three years working in the film industry. Southern California is beautiful and cosmopolitan, a fascinating place to explore when young and in love. Northern California is wild and varied, full of breathtaking scenery and tour destinations. Both are full of dreamers, people who left homes and family to pursue excitement and adventure in film.

In those years, we considered and released a dream of moving to Pasadena so I could pursue a graduate degree in Psychology; and later one of relocating to New Zealand so he could work on the Narnia movies. Either would have been an amazing experience, that would have steered our lives onto a different path than we are on today. Instead, we moved to Troy, Michigan to bring professional quality film skills to a church setting. For several years we enjoyed living within driving distance of our families and many good friends.

As we got to the point of starting our family, we began to discuss living even closer to family. The Captain's parents moved to Texas while I was pregnant with Boo, and soon we found ourselves building a dream of raising our family in Texas, living in the country with horses, and a self-supporting homestead. The more we dreamed, the more we visited, the stronger our desires grew to make that dream a reality.

Then one day we learned of a group from our church making plans to move to Salt Lake City and start a sister church to the one we were part of in Troy. A new dream ignited in our hearts, to bring our unique mix of skills and experience to the team, and join this new adventure. And we felt our purpose for that time in our lives was to pursue that dream to the best of our ability.

The dream did not disappoint. The years of setting up video production, teaching and consulting with the children's ministry team, leading home group meetings, and generally watching people's lives be changed by God's love, were some of the most spiritually exhilarating I have experienced.

Our dream of Texas was stored but never forgotten. After the church was past its beginning chapter, we felt released to pursue it once again. When the time was right, everything fell into place, and we found ourselves on another incredible journey that ended right where we had dreamed, under the wide open skies of Texas.

How blessed are we to be able to count so many dreams as having come true?

I love being married to a dreamer. I love to listen and tag along on his flights of fancy, wherever they may lead. We bring it out in one another, for I know his gentle whispers in my ear have encouraged me many times over the years to reach for a new dream.

This week, we are still dreaming of that self-supporting homestead, complete with a vineyard, bees, a house made out of freight containers, and enough land that we can shelter our family in the event of a zombie apocalypse. I'm going to build a reputation good enough to publish, allowing him to retire early so he can spend his time fixing up and renting old homes. He can manage bottling and distributing the wine and honey, while I manage our orchard and garden, and together we will solve the problems of the world while we live happily ever after.

I love to dream with my beloved.

Click here to go directly to the next post in the series.

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