Sketch of the dream behind my little tale.
Many years before there was television and before people lived in square houses, a young girl went into the desert with her friends, and after a long walk, they came to an oasis, a place where a natural spring bubbled up, and green plants could grow. There, they sat in the shade of trees and after eating their sandwiches and sweet purple grapes, they told each other about their dreams. The girl loved to talk about her dreams, and to hear about others’ dreams, because she believed that the dream world really existed, and that those things that they saw and did in dreams really did happen. Her friends laughed at her about this, calling her - sweetly and with little hugs - naive and childish, which did not bother her in the least.
One friend, whose name was Alex, dreamed about a bed that he had slept in as a little child. He remembered that bed because it was made of silver, and very heavy. ‘In my dream,’ he said, the bed carried me far way over the sea, and became a boat, and took me to a land of many foxes. That is all I remember,’ Alex said.
‘Oh, I love foxes!’ exclaimed the girl, and there was one in my dream as well. I was standing on a mountain looking over the valley with my baby brother, and I noticed a little fox in the grass, gazing at us. My brother ran towards it, that kind of waddling run that he used to have when he was smaller, and he disappeared into the grasses with the fox. I was very upset, but I knew the fox wouldn’t hurt him’.
Well, said another friend, whose name was Jenna, I dreamed I was a crane, flying, and it was wonderful’.
‘I don’t remember my dream,’ said the other friend sadly.
So they sat, talking quietly among themselves. It was hot, so the girl lay in a little hollow in the sand, where it was shady. And after a while, she feel asleep.
She awoke with a start, and saw her friends still talking. They had been dabbling their feet in the cool spring, and were standing beneath a tree in deep conversation. All of a sudden, the girl saw a great silver cot falling out of the sky and called out,
‘Watch out! That’s your dream bed, Alex, about to fall on you!’
Alex paid no attention, even when the bed just missed him and fell onto the girl. But she was ready, and held it off, though it really was heavy.
Then the girl saw her baby brother falling from the sky, laughing as though he were on a playground ride, and he landed lightly on the grass.
‘Oh hello dear brother,’ she said. ‘So, you’ve had enough of foxes for now.’
‘Look’, she called to her friends. ‘My brother has returned from the fox!’ No one heard her.
Then the girl saw a great white crane sailing across the sky, and it reminded her of her friend Jenna.
‘Jenna!’ she called. ‘Come down and see us, crane!’
But the bird called back, ‘I am on my way to the sea where the whales are playing,’ and flew on.
And then a small box fell down beside the girl, and on it was the name of her other friend, Tony. It was beautiful, but locked with a little key still in the lock. She knew at once what it was.
‘Come over here. Oh come over here,’ the girl called to her friends, and this time, they heard her.
‘What is that silver. . . . oh!’ exclaimed Alex. ‘My bed! The very one I dreamed of! How can that be?’
‘And there goes your crane, Jenna, on her way to watch the whales play,’ said the girl, pointing to the crane that was circling around them before flying out of sight.
‘How did you know that I was flying to watch whales?’ asked Jenna in astonishment. ‘I didn’t tell you that part of mu dream!’
‘No, you didn’t. The crane did,’ said the girl with a big smile.
‘And see, here is my baby brother, come back from the fox.’
The girl’s friends looked totally perplexed, especially when they spied a little red fox disappearing into a burrow beside one of the trees.
‘Here Tony,’ said the girl, handing the box to her friend. ‘I believe that is the dream you forgot last night.’
Tony stared at the box and the girl, not sure what to do.
‘Before you go to sleep tonight,’ the girl continued, ‘why not open the box and dream that dream again?’
Tony nodded dumbly. This was all too much. In fact, as the friends walked home, they could hardly talk from astonishment. The girl just smiled. She smiled because she knew that the world was full of surprises. There is so much that we don’t know about it.
As she parted from her friends to go home, Alex said quietly, not quite believing what he was saying, ‘Maybe we live right beside the land of dreams, but just don’t see it.’
Jenna nodded. ‘Yes, maybe it is a real place after all.’
Tony shook his head. ‘I just don’t believe it! Somehow, you’ve played a trick on us,’ he said to the girl, his eyes full of admiration because Tony did appreciate a good trick.
‘No,’ said the girl. ‘No trick. You just have to believe,’ and with that, she went home smiling all the way.
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