"Between Hopes And Dreams"

by Dom B.
2001.10.11

There's a valuable commodity that has been becoming leaner and leaner lately. It's something we take for granted, all of us. Well, almost all of us. It's a greater pick me up than caffeine, it's been around longer than Prozac.

It is sunlight.
The days are getting shorter.

I've often wondered about moving to Florida or Arizona. Would the constant sun, the scarcity of cloudy days, would these help me? Would I be able to survive the months of November through April without ten hours of sleep? Would I be more stable when it's 6 pm and still bright outside in December?

I'm wary of giving up, of copping out. Human life is very entwined with the cycles of the planet, whether we realize it, or like it. In winter we often sleep longer and crave more carbohydrates. Homo Sapiens is a very adaptable species, but we were designed for warm weather. The Neanderthals were more adapted to cold weather, and we all know what happened to them. The point is, some things are just the way they are.

I don't want to move down south to escape winter blahs. And to me, Fall is a beautiful time of year. The seasons are mirror to our souls. I can't be perpetually summer anymore than western PA can. Through change, we learn. Through change, we change. Change keeps reality honest.

Next week I'd like to do something different. I'd like you, dear reader, to email me the first four or five sentences of a short story, and I'll try to finish the story. I'm getting tired of living in my own head and I'd like to see what the inside of someone else's looks like for a little bit. You know my email address, and if not, you can find it on this site. As a fair trade, I'll give you the first few sentences of a story and I'd like you to send me the rest of the story. So here goes:

Five years. Five years is a long time when you need to pay the rent now, when you need to get the collection agency off your back now, when you need to eat, now. But five years is the shortest amount of time it would take, they said. Five years to apparent freedom. Or at least enough of an illusion of freedom to keep me from losing my mind...