Dreaming of Golden Mist

"Lay, my sweet child, and take a deep breath.

Breathe in, breathe out. No need to stress.

Imagine a bright purple sky and the warm breeze on your skin.

And as the birds all fly by, you dance, and you spin.

You get dizzy, and you laugh, then it starts to get cold.

the dark clouds all roll in, but it starts to rain gold.

And as you frolic through the meadow in the warm, golden mist,

You let go of all thoughts, all worries dismissed.

So, lay my sweet child, give your eyes a rest.

And dream a sweet dream, let your mind embark on a quest."

Original bedtime story by Hope Shelley

As a child, I always remember being told these calming bedtime stories to lull me to sleep at night. I always loved these stories, the soothing rhythm of my mother or fathers' voice reciting a poem or story to peacefully lay me into a deep slumber, one filled with vivid dreams. Not the bad ones, though. I mainly had colourful and creative dreams.

There was one bedtime story that I distinctly remember being my favourite. My mother always read "I Hope You Dance" by Mark D. Sanders and Tia Sillers. This story in particular never failed to bring me the sweetest dreams and let my mind run wild with creativity and hope for what the rest of my life would become. It was this rhyming, poetic book that inspired my story above. A story of happiness and simply being a carefree child; of living your life to the fullest. My mother would always sing the book to me, and as she sang I would fall deeper asleep, letting my sense of wonder and creativity spring to life.

The story I have composed above is one I genuinely hope to have the honor of reciting to my future child or children one day. My ultimate hope is that it brings them the same joy and happiness in which I was brought as a child through stories read to me. I hope it brings wonder to their developing minds, and I hope it sparks a creative wave in their mind to bring them the sweetest of dreams, just as "I Hope You Dance" brought me a child. I hope the short and simplistic rhymes lull them into a deep and peaceful slumber, where their minds can quite literally "embark on a quest", whether that entails frolicking freely through a meadow of golden mist, or another fantasized journey that can only be played out in their dreams. The story I wrote above is not only for my future children to remind themselves to just breathe later in life, but to also remind myself to practice what I preach. Though I will be a grown adult then, it's always a good time to cast away to my own land of meadows and dancing, where I can remind myself to breathe and that everything will be just fine. That it's always okay to just close my eyes, and dream.

I hope this bedtime story can be passed on through generations to come, and that my future children have the opportunity to tell it to their future children. And so on, and so forth. I hope that my future children cherish their bedtime stories for life, and that they hold on to that spark of being carefree through the trials and tribulations of life, and that they tell it to themselves every-so-often to remember not to worry, and to just breathe. Remember that safe place filled with purple skies and golden rain, and never let it go.