Crashing Dreams

With her arms outstretched, her long red hair trailing behind her like a kite, she glided through a cloud. Her eyes closed, a blissful smile played on her lips. She felt the cloud caress her body like a tuft of cotton. With her hands pressed together, she dove through the cloud into the warm shower of the sun. She cut through the infinite blue with slow, rhythmic movements of her arms.

As she moved, her blanket nearly slipped off her bed, and her stuffed animal slid away from her.

She floated over the landscape, her eyes hungry for adventure, almost devouring the overwhelming view. She saw her own house, far below her. She twirled through the sky. The warm air caressed her, sending her dress billowing around her body.

She saw her mother and waved, swimming through the air as she glided past. Her mother looked up and waved back, calling out something in return. But the words drifted away from her, across the landscape, toward the sea. She followed them, watching as they tumbled over each other in loose, dancing letters.

She tried to catch them with her small hands. Like a mermaid, she darted through the blue ocean of sky. The world was her runway, the sky an endless playground.

She felt her mother’s hand on her arm. Gently, she shook her awake. “Lizzy, sweetie,” she said softly, “time to land!” She opened her big blue eyes and found her mother smiling down at her. “Were you off on another adventure, honey?”

Lizzy closed her eyes for a moment. The world she had just left behind was so much more beautiful than the reality she now found herself in. “Yes, Mommy, and I saw you! You waved at me and called out something, but I couldn’t make out what you said. Do you remember what it was?”

Her mother stroked her cheek and brushed a strand of red hair from her face. “I think I said you had to come down. Because you had to get ready for school. And because I secretly always feel a little nervous when I see my sweet Lizzy tumbling so high through the clouds.”

Lizzy stretched and hugged her pink stuffed cat close. Yawning, she kicked the blanket off. “But Mommy,” she said, “you’re always really proud of me when I fly over you, aren’t you?” As her mother took her clothes out of the closet, she replied with a smile: “When you fly over me, I can’t see your face, but I know your eyes sparkle like sunlight on water. That your cheeks are like soft red velvet pillows. And that your little brain under your beautiful red hair knows you can do anything, as long as you really, really want to!”

Those words tasted like candy in Lizzy’s mouth. She savored them, swallowed them, and felt them spread through her body. On the way to school, Lizzy sat on the back of her mother’s bike with her arms spread wide. “If we fly, we’ll go faster, won’t we, Mommy? Then we’ll never be late again.” Her mother smiled and pedaled a little harder, so that the airplane her bike had become would land in the schoolyard right on time.

Her mother’s words had emboldened her. She would start carefully. In her mind, she pictured a little bird perched on the edge of its nest. Should she just let herself fall? Should she jump, flapping her arms, like she did in her dreams? She cleared the little table in her room and lifted it onto her bed with arms trembling from the effort. Now she stood on that wobbly table, on her bed, ready for her first flight into a world that wouldn’t vanish when she opened her eyes.

She clenched her jaw, leaned forward and swung her arms out. The wooden floor creaked as she crashed onto the ground with her shoulder. The little table toppled off the bed so loud that her mother, downstairs in the kitchen, startled and cut her finger.

Her mother found Lizzy crumpled on the floor in a tangled heap, the little table right next to her. She was crying, but not because she was in pain. “It’s not true, Mommy!” she sobbed, her face flushed, her eyes covered by her messy hair.

Her mother gently helped her to her feet, tipping her chin up, so their eyes would meet. “You were flying,” she said, her voice steady and serious, “you just crashed.”

There had been other attempts. She was getting better and better at crashing. Once, she had even truly flown—or so she thought. Her father had told her to close her eyes. And believe, really believe, that this time it would work. He had lifted her onto a cabinet and told her to jump, with her eyes shut tight.

She had done it, and for a fleeting moment, dream and reality merged. She didn’t crash. She soared forward, flapping her arms—she was flying! She would fly right out the window, higher and higher, and then tumble through the clouds just like in her dreams.

She was so swept up in the magic that it took her a few seconds to feel it. Her father’s hands, wrapped around her waist.

He had caught her and was now running through the room with her, lifted high above his head.

The magic slipped away, like the last grain of sand in an hourglass.

She would never really be able to fly. Wings would never sprout from her back. All that practice had been for nothing. Even though she really, really wanted to.

She had stomped off to her room, the realization sinking in: it just wasn’t true. And her mother knew it. From that moment on, she stopped sharing her dreams with her mother. And when her father played with her, she kept her eyes wide open. She also stopped crashing.

But in her dreams, she kept flying, farther and farther, higher and higher. In the backseat of her father’s car, they pretended the trees and bushes whizzing by were clouds. He’d roll down the windows as they drove down the highway, letting the wind rush in. That way, it felt as though they were cutting through the air, soaring together.

Even in high school, she had secret moments when she gave herself space for her imagination. When she ran on the track, or hustled to class up the long stairs in the school. She felt the imaginary wings unfold, and it seemed to help her; at any rate, she was never late.

Not even during her training. It was demanding, it was tough, but she wanted this. Really, really wanted this.

While growing up her mother’s words had always flown with her.

She settled firmly in her seat. Her blood coursed through her veins. For a moment, her eyes caught the light—like water in the sun. She peered out the cockpit window. And she waved at the imaginary house, far below her. Her mother waved back. This time she could finally understand what she was saying: “You’re flying, Lizzy! And if you really don’t want to, you’ll never have to crash.”

She carefully lowered the nose of the plane. Her lips curled into a smile like a purring cat. She disappeared into a fluffy white cloud.