Sweet dreams are made of this…
My son, the Superhero, 6, often talks in his sleep. He laughs, he yells, he mumbles things I can’t understand — all of which I can hear when I’m getting ready for bed.
For years, I’ve wondered what he dreamt about that delighted him so. So many decades have passed between my current age and childhood, it’s hard to imagine dreams that are pure and innocent, with only 6-year-old touchstones, and not a lifetime of experience seeping through.
But whenever I asked Superhero about his dreams, he never remembered.
Last night, as we were reading one of our favorite books, Where the Wild Things Are (which is also the inspiration of the name of this blog), we got to this page and he said, “If I had that dream about all those monsters, I think it would be a bad dream.”
Max tames the beasts before the wild rumpus.
So I said, “What do you like to dream about? Do you remember?”
An enormous smile slowly spread across his tired, tanned face. “Race cars. And flying a rocket ship.”
The joy that suddenly filled me was palpable. It was so fun to hear for the first time the other worlds in which he spend his sleeping time.
“I always win the car races,” he said, turning to a page in one of his books, “and it looks just like this track.”
His favorite is the Formula One racer, which hits 200mph.
“In the rocket ship races, I always come in third and get a bronze medal. The starting line is on Earth and the finish line is on Jupiter.”
One of his favorite books for the past two years.
So innocent and pure. Maybe he’ll be pilot or an astronaut someday!
Then he said, “What do you dream about?”
I thought about the harsh realities of life and the world that creep their way into grown-up dreams from time to time and decided, Nothing as fun as that.
So I said, “Well, one thing I like to dream about is shopping for beautiful shoes.”
“Oh,” he said quietly, trying to hide his disappointment. “That doesn’t seem fun at all.”
I laughed. If only he knew. “Well, bud,” I said, “you have a lot to learn about the ladies.”
He was all, “I don’t think kid girls dream about that. Probably only adult ladies.”
And you know what? He’s probably right.
I really miss being six right now. I wonder what I’d dream about if I were six again.
The Wild Rumpus 
Aww, what a sweetie 🙂
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