I was lying in a gazebo in a bright white cotton robe with a pot of steaming coffee and 2% on a tray at my side in addition to a crispy warm croissant and apricot jam, my favorite. The sun was just waking up and so was I. There was a babbling fountain to the left of me, pouring into a pool the size of my LA apartment and I was alone. There were strangely colored birds of black and yellow and red twirping and socializing away. There was the ocean 100 yards from me, gently nudging the shore, but other than that, it was quiet.

I was 22 and working in a hotel in Beverly Hills. The man I worked with loved hotels. He liked to take me to hotels to have drinks and meet the people that worked there. He was, is, beautiful and I was in love with him.
He was also gay. But it didn't keep me away from dreaming with him as we took ourselves away from our lives in LA to these little oasis' within our city to experience the decadent escape of our realities.
We followed the path of the W, Ian Schrager and hotel boutiques around the globe from the Ritz to the Four Seasons, even if it was just within a few miles of our LA apartments. It was grand.

I loved the idea of escape, nurturing, nestling oneself in the small community of a hotel life. I actually believed I might really like the lifestyle of working in hotel sales.
It was my day job, but it was my friend's dream. He still lives his life traveling abroad and visiting these little blisscapes and getting paid to do it!

I remember looking online at the Ritz Carlton in Bali. I remember saving their main home page as my screen saver on my computer and thinking, if things don't work out here, in LA, I'm going to move there, to Bali, to the Ritz and work there. Doing what, I have no idea, but it was a little dream.

Ten years later, I'm sitting right here, in the exact picture of what my dream is.
The exact screen saver on my computer.

My boyfriend, at the time, came out of our villa. Yup, villa, and sauntered over to me quietly. We sat there for a while before he asked me this, "What are your dreams?"

I said, "I'm sorry, but I don't think I can answer that question right now as I am living one of them now."

I've had many dreams in my life. Some of them come to life for an instant, an hour, a day and they are gone.
I've always appreciated them when they've come but never looked at them quite like this one.
Because, I was sitting there in it, with nothing to do, act on or think about. All I had to do was be in it.
Just be.

How often can we just BE in a dream, really?

Even if we are living in the beauty of a dream we have acted on and are acting in, it is almost impossible to remove ourselves from that moment, stand back and say, see?! See what I am doing?! Isn't this great? All this hard work has lead me to HERE. 'Cause so often we are carried on the wave of the next thought, the next part of the journey of our dream. Perhaps the accolades and perhaps the solitude when we arrive home after the dream task has been met.

When I was in Bali, I felt like I was being my dream.
I felt so complete (even before my boyfriend, now my ex, came out to engage me).
I'm not a big vacation person. It's still difficult for me to unwind and get into 'relaxing'. That's why yoga retreats and the like are more my fancy because it almost forces me to 'chill'.

But when I found myself, right there, in the middle of what was right, even when I know that the Ritz prides themselves on making it a dream come true for anyone who visits, and they freekin' do (the Ritz in Jimbaryan Bay, Bali is ridiculous), I felt the same feeling you feel when you truly connect with yourself and your needs...in quiet.

We find this in yoga, in running, in spending time with our kids or husband, walking the beach at sunset or meeting someone for the first time.

We find this all the time, but sometimes we don't have the time to really take in the glory of the moment. The glory that each moment brings to a current or past dream realized.

I've always been a dreamer, to a fault. It's my heart that keeps me going toward the things that keep me most fulfilled and driven to share what I can with others.

The reward is in the feeling.

I like when my dreams can reward me financially as well, I'm not gonna lie.

But I can dream in both accounts, the feeling and financial.

As one gets older, dreams change.

Sometimes you achieve a dream and it's not what you thought. There are many responsibilities etc., perhaps.

I feel like such an adult and there is no avoiding it, 'cause I am.

I'm not a kid. I don't wish that I was, but sometimes, I don't wish that I was an adult and in this world and there is no name for the in-betweens.

So I have to make some decisions. They are based on what I dream of. Now that I have gotten a little of the dream, right here in Santa Monica, I'm starting to waiver on that decision. Cold feet? Hmmm, not so sure. It's the responsibility that follows the dream/decision that I've made that I'm not sure I want to live with/sacrifice for all the other things I hold so dear.

I've got some time to think, some time to decide, some time to be adult and some time for me to remember what it's like to be living a dream.

When I take myself further away from the dream, decisions get harder to make.

So, I'm trying to remember. By being here.

I want to stay here in Santa Monica where the sunsets, daily, make me weep for the possibility of greatness for everyone including myself. I also don't want to cripple myself so that I can't visit all the other gazebos I long for or afford the things that can progress myself professionally.

So, as an adult, I have to compromise, and look at my dream, the current one, to live and work here in Santa Monica, that I've achieved!!
and reallllllly look at it for what it is. Do I want to make it last for a moment or a while?

Indecision is not becoming.
Time is ticking.
Things are changing.
Turkeys are cooking.
Lights need to be lifted and turned on.
Presents need wrapping.
Tis' the season....

Let me dream on it.

With gratitude to all, Happy Holidays!!
In flux, breathing deeply, drinking lots of water and calling my mother,
Laurie