Dreamers

Do you know what I love? I love dreamers. I love entrepreneurs. I love thinking about what could be, about where our longings mesh with the world’s needs. It makes me so happy not only to dream, but also to help other people dream.

My second year in college, when I had no idea what I wanted my career to be, I went to a career counselor who talked at length with me about my passions, gave me two different personality tests to do and then came up with a list of careers for me. I came away from the experience thinking I wanted to be one thing: a career counselor. Ha! It makes sense, though. He had helped me to dream.

I went to visit my best friend Ebony on Saturday. It was the first time I’d visited her alone in over four years. We sat for two hours at a Mexican restaurant, where I cluelessly broke my Lenten fast and later conjured the courage to say to the manager, “¡Que tenga un buen día!,” because for some reason I (someone who used to work with Latin American immigrant children—WHO ALL SPOKE SPANISH) find it difficult to muster up my gringo voice to wish someone a good day.

Anyway, then we went to a coffee shop that hand brews every. single. cup of joe. I never meant to turn into a coffee snob. Truly, I’m a tea drinker, but you can’t study abroad in Italy and not turn into a coffee snob, or just a snob in general. Thankfully, I think, I managed to scrape through without becoming your run-of-the mill snob. This place made me feel like I wasn’t wrong for being elitist about my coffee. They had about 50 different specialty brews, and I was able to pick the exact brew that seemed to fit my taste (light roast - chocolate & hazelnut notes, of course) and have a five-minute-conversation with the barista about what my personal coffee needs were for that moment… The more I think on this, the more I realize coffee culture might just be about control. But I’m not going there. Just let me have my moment, as a stay-at-home mother whose control over her children is only slightly more than her control over the weather. I pray.

Ebony and I sat at a little round table, and we continued our two-hour conversation for another two hours, and it was magnificent. We talked about everything from patriarchy to theology. But what I liked most was talking about Ebony’s dreams, asking her questions about what sort of nonprofit she wants to run, thinking about how to better the lonely world.

I came away from that day more energized and focused than I’ve been in months. It was a combination of a lot of things that helped—getting out of routine for a day, being with my best friend, dreaming and philosophizing. Thinking about people’s dreams makes me excited. Now, implementing them and maintaining them is something entirely different, but no one asked me to do that, not yet.

It was in Italy that I really learned to dream. A mentor friend had given me a book before I left called Dare to Dream. It’s geared towards Christians and focuses on the idea that, as followers of the King of the Universe, we shouldn’t ignore the hankerings of the heart. God has placed them there. In the book, he asks you to think about the movie character that you have always most wanted to be, and why, because usually there’s something telling about this. There, in that white-walled, high-ceilinged, cold convent room, I thought of it: Meg Ryan in You’ve Got Mail. Why? Because of her little shop, all those small but personal and poignant interactions throughout her day. And that is why I want to open a tea shop eventually.

All this to say, I’m a fan of dreaming. Right now, life with my toddler and baby is mostly about maintenance, but very soon, it will be about helping them to dream. I think I might be able to do that. In the meantime, I’ll practice with friends. If you’re a creative in the middle of an intense, maintenance-filled season, may I suggest coffee with a friend who knows how to dream? May I suggest the light roast with chocolate and hazelnut notes, and a dollop of cream? It might be just the thing.