Dare to dream
What child hasn’t dreamed of greatness?
As a kid, I whiled away countless hours pitching a tennis ball against the brick wall at St. John the Apostle Elementary School in Ottawa.
More often than not it was the seventh game of the World Series, bottom of the ninth and I was simultaneously the star athlete and colour commentator.
“It’s a full count with two out and runners in scoring position for Reggie Jackson. A hit now and the Yankees will be world champions again. Barker winds up and delivers a blistering fastball. Strike three! The rookie from Canada has struck out the Yankee slugger and won the World Series for his Montreal Expos!”
I was a pretty decent ball player back in the day, but my capacity for fantasy far surpassed my capacity for the discipline and sacrifice becoming an elite athlete entails.
As my focus turned to the arts, my dreams of glory did not diminish. I can’t tell you how many times lapses of concentration while creating songs or writing stories has turned into Grammy Award or Nobel Prize acceptance speeches.
As a little girl, Janelle Yardley dreamed of curling with the best of the best. As she competed in the drafty, corrugated aluminum rinks of Northwestern B.C., she no doubt had visions of making the perfect draw or double raise against Colleen Jones to win the Scotties Tournament of Hearts.
The difference, of course, is that last week, while I was scribbling notes at the press table at that very event, Janelle was living the dream.
The hard truth of the matter is that, while we all have the same capacity to dream, very few of us ever actually reach an elite level in whatever it is we wind up doing. By middle age, the vast majority of us are looking back on a series of near misses, squandered potential and reduced expectations.
I’ve interviewed my fair share of people who have reached the pinnacle in their fields: athletes, politicians, business magnates, musicians and scientists. You’d think it would be a little bit depressing, a reminder that I may be around them, but I’m not among them.
It’s not depressing, though, on the contrary. There are a few characteristics all of these people share. Paramount among those traits is the attitude that losing is not a failure, or even a setback, but an opportunity for growth. They remind as that dreams do come true; that glory is achievable; that success is not necessarily in the result, but in the trying.
I offer my congratulations to Smithers’ latest great achiever, Janelle Yardley, and thank her for reminding me it’s okay to dare to dream.
