Dream Big At Any Age

When I was in 5th grade I went to the library. I always loved the library - you could lose yourself in a world of make beleive - create a world of wonder. The library held the tools I needed to daydream. I love going there and I loved to read. It here that I first started reading National Geographic magazine. Boy, did they have some beautiful pictures of exotic places, places no one in my family had ever gone - nor had any of my friend's family ever gone to visit these far away places. The farthest my family ever got to visiting another "land" was family vacations to St Louis - and we were grateful for that. Yet, even as a young child, I knew there was a world out there, one that I wanted to see, to explore. One day, while I was going through a National Geographic magazine, I came across a picture of a something that took my breath away. At that time I had never really heard of the country of Italy. Oh, I saw the name on one of those old fashioned globes we had in the classroom - but didn't know anything about it. As I scanned the pages of pictures my eyes fell upon a photo - one that would define and create the foundation of a dream. The photo-the leaning tower of Pisa. I vowed, that one day, I would go see the Leaning Tower of Pisa. An interesting thing about dreams - be careful who you tell. People made fun of me - laughed at my dream. Know what - I didn't care - I knew I would see the Leaning Tower of Pisa - no matter how long it would take - no matter waht others said. Some 40 years later - my dream came true.... Even though I didn't know it the time - my strong belief in knowing what I wanted set the stage for this as well as many other dreams. Looking at that picture still brings tear to my eyes.. dreams do come true. I did it :0)