Life is but a dream, sweetheart...

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I have just spent four lovely January days in sunny, WARM, southern California, hanging with family. The economy is tough and stressors are magnified, but these people I love are still amazing and I am happy to see them. My cousin's daughter is a year a half, head full of curly hair, mouth full of teeth, and a wonderful cheesy smile! She is still so tiny, which is nice because I don't feel like she has changed so much since I saw her at Thanksgiving. My three year old godson, however, I haven't seen since July and he has changed tremendously. He gets on the phone and holds a conversation, ending it with "I love you, Auntie Shi Shi!", and I am ready to give him whatever he wants--my car, a kidney, whatever! Something about those kids...they diffuse my self-centered, self-indulging tendencies, AND make me feel secure. Yes, they make me secure, because as long as they exist, hope and innocence and unconditional love exist, and something in the world is right...
Okay, now that is not the main reason for today's posting, for me to go on about how children enrich my life. No, I want to finally put down an ongoing conversation about life's relationship to illusion and reality. This conversation started between myself and a good friend several years ago, and ultimately is the reason for the name of this blog--translates "I only want the truth". I can't remember the exact moment but a bottle of wine was involved and it started along these lines: my friend firmly believes that life is but a series of illusions we create for ourselves to make life tolerable, if not enjoyable. He states that there is no reality, nothing is real, and if it was, we couldn't handle it without losing our minds (enter Jack Nicholson voice "you can't handle the truth!"). Therefore, he believes you have to live in only the moment, not thinking as to how it may relate to other moments because they don't relate, it is just an illusion that they are related...hmmm, chew on that a bit...no, seriously, think about it because I have to end this post and counter it later, otherwise I will miss my plane to Denver to deliver my godson the boat he requested. Safe travels, all...;)