Don't Dream, It's Over

I never thought that could be the problem.

I have too many dreams.

I'm not talking the "I'm going to be a vet when I grow up" dreams. I'm talking the "how this should have gone", "what I was actually supposed to say", "what might have been" kind of dreams.

That's weird, isn't it? That imagining different outcomes to a specific situation is an act of "dreaming."

Leah Nash, of Sixpence None the Richer, sings "don't dream, its over." I listened to that song on the bus this morning, and after admiring Leah's voice as per usual, I began to mull the title statement of the song over. The cheery, blissfully sweet tone Leah gives the phrase, followed by words of "they come...to build a wall between us", has lead me to accept the meaning of the title line to be "Don't worry. No matter what happens I love you. You love me. And we're together." Or, "The battle's been fought and we have won. They can keep trying to tear us apart, but we've already won. They can't affect us."

Don't dream, its over.

But suddenly "dream" wasn't a metaphor for dwelling in the uncertainty of a romantic relationship under siege. Hours later, without thinking on the song more than acknowledging which tune was stuck in my head, all prior interpretation of the phrase fell through, leaving me with the thought that "dreaming" is imagining how life would be going if I was sitting in the director's chair with unlimited resources.

There was a substitute teacher in my high school who could read your personality by looking at you and talking with you; and it could be indepth if given your signature. She sat across from me in my eleven-member English class and told the basics on everyone's personalities as she looked around the room.

"This one's a romantic." She said about me. "That's not a bad thing. You're a dreamer, and you set things up and when someone doesn't act right you..." She sighed, signaling sorrow.

I started dreaming before the interpretation change struck me. I started thinking about how it's too bad I didn't make that show, and he didn't end up playing my brother so we could end up falling in love for real. And that that guy should have asked me to dance. Or at least introduced himself. Or asked for my number.

I came to a halt in my stair ascension.

Don't dream, it's over.

There's nothing to be done. No amount of imagination can change the outcome of anything. Fantasizing only makes the truth harder to attain. There's nothing tangible in fantasy; it's merely a synonym for dream. I spend the dull patches of my days living life in the past, fixing my mistakes and missed cues of others.

Live today. Keep in the present. Be engaged in your surroundings as though performing on stage, as though someone were always watching. But don't try altering the script. Just follow as the directions come.

And don't dream, it's over.