A Dream Life

Martin, like most people, measured his life in years and forty-eight had passed. He often thought of a different scale, one with a secret number that measured such things as richness and fulfillment, but he feared that number would lower than he would have liked. In all his forty-eight years, Martin had not done much, so years were used and secret numbers remained secret.

He often wandered about his house in search of something missed the last time, a photo or a note, anything worth keeping, but he found nothing. From room to room, neither closet nor drawer contained any remnant of pleasant memory. He was like a newborn, yet he had lived forty-eight years. Later that night, while sleep outran his chase, he realized that memories would not make themselves. He caught sleep eventually, pinned it down and let slumber settled upon him, along with a feeling that his life, forty-eight years after it began, was about to start.

He caught sight of her in a used bookstore. She perused travel and later that day, they discussed vacations from either side of cappuccino. A mere three months later, their first trip abroad was Martin’s first trip abroad, ever.

She accepted his proposal. Their only child came late in life, but not too late.

More travel slid years past faster than he would have liked, but he no longer measured life in years. Secret numbers, the ones that accounted for richness and fulfillment, far outweighed his age.

At sixty-nine, adventure lived through his son. Years of excursion had left him tired. He now preferred home, to receive postcards, to reminisce; his closets and drawers brimmed with memory.

At seventy-seven, he slept reflective. He recalled his life, the joys he had come to know. The woman who started it all, nearly thirty years before, still took the pillow next to his; he thought she looked more beautiful now than then. His lips smiled, his eyes closed, never to open again.

And somewhere, a lonesome man of forty-eight died in his sleep. Hours after his life began, his heart stopped, but he did not die the wretched death of someone with no past. Rather he let go with a smile on his face, a woman by his side, and a mind full of memories. Such is the power of a dream.