Dreams are some of the most odd, and sometimes most uncomfortable, experiences for us. They can sometimes also be so realistic that we do not even know if we are awake or still dreaming. One can feel the same after a false awakening, where one dreams of having been awakened. In a false awakening, the room in which a person becomes awake is commonly similar to the room in which he fell asleep. This feeling may end with a sign during a dream and then it suddenly dawns on the person that he is experiencing a dream instead of reality. This is called lucid dreaming, which can be described as being aware that you are dreaming and are in control of your dreams. A person can also enter the dream state while he is conscious and can control the dream. Before exploring the endless possibilities of lucid dreaming, we will start with the physical nature of dreams. The spiritual nature and interpretation of dreams from a metaphysical standpoint are discussed in previous articles [1-4] of The Fountain Magazine.

Dreaming is a state of consciousness in which one can experience anything imaginable [5]. What you can do or experience in dreams is usually not limited to physical boundaries. We walk, run, fly, and even pass through walls. We see many symbols that may represent multiple meanings. Dreams can relate to the past, present, and the future of a person. They can help us to remember our pasts, understand the present, and shed light upon the future. Dreaming is an interesting part of our lives and the contents of our dreams are usually fed from our daily experiences.

Dreams are defined as a succession of thoughts, images, sounds, or emotions which the mind experiences during sleep [6]. It is also described differently in many areas: physiologically as a response to neural processes during sleep; psychologically as reflections of the subconscious; and spiritually as messages from God, the deceased, or predictions of the future [7]. Dreaming is not only unique to humans. Studies show that some animals, and even plants, have high brain activity while they sleep which could mean that they dream. However, remembering dreams is unique to humans. It enables communication with the inner mind, helps self-knowledge, and advances an individual and society [8].

Dreams are also an important source of inspirations in history. We know many examples of inventions that were inspired by, and problems that were solved with, the help of dreams. Niels Bohr, famous Danish physicist, got the Nobel Prize in physics in 1922 due to a dream that enlightened him to figure out the structure of an atom. George Frideric Handel, German-English Baroque composer, heard the last pieces of his most popular work, The Messiah, in a dream he had. Elias Howe was inspired with a dream for his famous needle design that was required for a lock-stitch sewing machine. Famous chemist, Friedreick Kekule’s (1829–1896) dream helped him to make one of the amazing discoveries of his time [9], the discovery of benzene ring. After spending so much time on scientific problems, they become a part of their subconscious and feed their dreams.

There are mental blocks that prevent us from thinking creatively such as “a problem can’t be solved by using a specific method” or “a scientific approach against our current understanding of the theory”. Ray Kurzweil, one of the world’s leading inventors, thinks that these assumptions and limitations are relaxed in our dream state and so we can think about new ways of solving problems without limiting ourselves with these constraints [10]. Also, during dreaming our rational faculties are not evaluating whether an idea is reasonable or not, which helps us to think outside-of-the-box and produce creative solutions. Another constraint with these scientific problems is time. Repetitive experiments take quite some time with many unfruitful results. Thomas Edison, the inventor of the practical electric light bulb, literally tested thousands of different substances as filaments that would work in his experiments. Dreams can provide an opportunity to rapidly work on time consuming problems within a relatively short time span.

A common misconception regarding dreams is that we experience hours’ worth of events and activities  in a matter of seconds. Despite this common belief about the expansion of time in dreams, they seem to flow at the same rate as time does in the real world [11]. Five minutes of activity in our dreams probably would take about five minutes in our daily life. In that case, how can we explain that some of our dreams seem to last hours, days or even longer? The answer to this perception of time seems to be that dreams are cinematic. Movies generally cover a longer time period than the two hours that we spent in front of the screen. Just like these movies, we concentrate on the interesting parts of the dreams and leave out the rest. If you are trying to solve a scientific problem in your dream, wouldn’t it be nice to skip all the repetitive, unproductive, and time-consuming parts such as planning, research, experiment design, decision making, and analysis of the results?

All of these advantages of dreams for solving problems requires being awake and even in control of your dreams as is the case with lucid dreaming. Lucid dreaming is not a new term, as it was coined by the Dutch psychiatrist and writer Frederik van Eeden (1860–1932). The existence of lucid dreaming is well established and has been researched scientifically [12]. During a lucid dream, a person can actively be in control and change experiences in the dream environment. Lucid dreams can start as a normal dream when the person realizes that he or she is dreaming (DILD, Dream-Initiated Lucid Dream), or a person can go from a normal state to dream state while preserving the consciousness (WILD, Wake Induced Lucid Dream). There are many techniques to induce lucid dreaming such as dream-recall, reality testing, identifying dream-signs, mnemonic induction, and napping.  Many people experience lucid dreaming, but it is a skill one can develop. With proper training and exercise, one can increase lucid dreaming frequency from once per month to once per night.

A common method to determine if you are in a dream is called reality testing. The test simply includes performing an action and checking whether the expected results are consistent with real life. An unexpected result of the test lets the person realize that they are in a dream. When the person is lucid and aware in a dream, then he can exercise control and practice basic tasks, even the actions that contradict with known physical rules. A new world opens its doors to endless possibilities where all the actions are bound only with imagination. Flying, jumping from a plane without a parachute and landing safely, walking on water, teleportation between distant locations, transforming scenes, and telekinesis would be your everyday activities. You may feel how limiting our daily life is and that you are meant to live in a world where you can use your unlimited imagination.

An obvious benefit of lucid dreaming is being the basis of the most effective therapy for nightmares [13]. If you are aware that you are dreaming then there is no need to fear anything, including even the most horrifying monsters, because nothing can cause you physical harm. This may encourage you to face the threat rather than avoiding it. Lucid dreams feel extremely realistic and it is not easy to differentiate from real life. Many people use lucid dreaming for rehearsals. It can be used to improve public speaking, artistic performance, athletic activities, and courage for competitions. Realistic features of lucid dreaming can be used to fulfill one’s longing for his loved ones, relatives living abroad, or even for ones passed away. Lucid dreaming can be used as a meeting place for the ones living apart and do not have a chance to meet regularly. This will be a virtual meeting not only in the sense of telepresence but also the ones you meet will be a construct of your brain.

The brain is highly active during dreaming and not constrained by physical senses. This contributes to creative thinking and novel combinations of events and objects in our dreams. When combined with the cinematic behavior of dreams, lucid dreams can provide a platform for creative thinking and ideas for scientific issues by skipping the repetitive and time-consuming steps. There are other ways to use lucid dreaming for educational purposes. A quickly scanned book can be recalled from memory and read thoroughly. One can practice memorization of scriptures or even dictionaries. It can be used for learning and practicing a foreign language and all other repetitive learning processes.

Another area of application for lucid dreaming is healing. Patients can use dreams to enhance waking performance, improve physical health, alleviate and soothe pain, overcome phobias, achieve self-confidence, practice physical skills, recover neuromuscular functions, recover from injuries, and an increased sense of freedom for the disabled. Our last example but maybe the most exciting application area of lucid dreaming is entertainment. The movies and computer games cannot provide the experience as realistic as you can get in your dreams including even movies with a budget of hundreds of millions of dollars and the latest projection technologies. You can create your own big budget movie and be the main actor in your lucid dream. How would you design your new Jurassic Park or Matrix movie?

The realistic experience in dreams leads us to the question, “If this is not real, what is?” What if the world we think and live in is another construct and that we are waiting to wake up into another “real” world? We need to look beyond our daily lives and question the nature of reality and our purpose in this life. Are we living in this world to be a small actor in a dream or to take back the control and get ready to wake up into the “real” world? Maybe it is time for a reality check…

Acknowledgment: This article was produced by using MERGEOUS [14], an online article and project development platform for authors and publishers dedicated to the advancement of technologies in the merging realm of science and religion.

References

1. John Young, “Interpreting Dreams,” The Fountain, Issue 29, January–March, 2000.
2. John Young, “Dreams: A Spiritual Approach Part II,” The Fountain, Issue 30, April–June, 2000.
3. Muhammed Toprak, “A Historical Review of Dreams,” The Fountain, Issue 65, September–October, 2008.
4. Stephen LaBerge, “Lucidity Research, Past and Future”,
5. http://www.lucidity.com/NL53.ResearchPastFuture.html
6. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. 2000. Retrieved 2009-05-07.
7. Wikipedia, “Dream”, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dream
8. School of Metaphysics, “The Intuitive Nature of our Dreams”, Retrieved 2010-06-05.
9. Halil I. Demir, “Forbidden Inspirations”, Mergeous Pre-print Articles.
10. http://www.mergeous.com/articlepreprintins.asp?aid=57&type=fulltext
11. Association for Computing Machinery, “Singularity: Ubiquity Interviews – Ray Kurzweil”.
12. Daniel Erlacher and Michael Schredl, “Time required for motor activity in lucid dreams”, Perceptual and Motor Skills, 2004. 99, 1239-1242.
13. Watanabe Tsuneo, “Lucid Dreaming: Its Experimental Proof and Psychological Conditions”. Journal of International Society of Life Information Science (Japan), 2003. 21 (1): 159–162.
14. The Lucidity Institute, “Frequently asked questions about lucid dreaming”, Version 2.3, July 16, 2004.
15. Mergeous, online article and project development platform. http://www.mergeous.com

It is beautiful not just because it is a source of euphoria for them, but because they know they can inspire more people to pursue their dreams, and to spread love around the world.

For those who dream, life is like a magnificent train station. You meet people, you get to taste the finest cuisine, you explore beautiful sights, and you see history unfold in front of your eyes – just like those people who frequent the grand terminals in major cities of the world.

Sure, these dreamers may experience many tribulations and obstacles in the pursuit of their dreams; however, they know that facing the blackest darkness is a part of seeing the value of the light. When one does not see the depths of the abyss, one never knows the real worth of the sun. When a person does not feel the gray overcast looming over one’s head, there is no way to appreciate the wonders of a rainbow.

I love those who dream big, because they are not afraid to face the world. I love those who have the audacity to face the world, because I know that deep inside, I can trust them. I love those who try hard to achieve their dreams, because I love seeing hard work rewarded in the best way possible.

I do not love those who are flippant, those who stab people in the back, or those who spread hate across this blue-domed planet we call Earth. We have had more than enough violence and despair in this world; why do we need any more of it?

Do we want to see more children washed up on a shore far from their homeland? Do we want to see more women crying? Do we want to see more young people drifting away from humanity? All those dreamers say: we will put our lives on the line if it means we can make the world infinitesimally better than it was. Indeed, they do it in their own way, working every single day to lead a life that is worthy of example.

They say that “sometimes, the only payoff for having any faith is that it gets tested again and again every day.” This is true to a great extent. Indeed, sometimes, the hardships the faithful face are Herculean, to the point that it drives one to madness. But in the face of such difficulties, the faithful must ask: are we just fighting for this world? Because one fact is for real: there is another world, whose beauty is unheard of, not even in fiction – the likes of which are beyond anyone’s imagination.

To those who dream big, here is a message to you: Never let go of your dreams. If those dreams are connected to the lofty cause that you love, then pursue them to the last ounce of your breath!

I am sorry, give me a minute.
…

You see, I easily lose my head. So, I need to use medications to balance my mood. Oh my God! That was supposed to be a secret, and it just slipped from my mouth to an admirer. Look, I suspect that once you learn my most-hidden aspects, my reputation with you will be ruined, and you won’t love me anymore. And it really distresses me to have failed your high expectations of an equation like me.

Nevertheless, it is such a heavy burden to suppress one side of mine while constantly showing the other. Yes, being an equation, I am well balanced and very clear about my views. I am one of those lucky theories that have a sound mathematical foundation, and this is why even the psychologists could not suspect a grain of problem due to my childhood. But I am telling you: I am bipolar….

Well, wait a minute! Who are you, and why would I share my secret with you? Go away with your own business, and leave me alone. I mean, I don’t want to disrespect you, but this is my private life, you know! …

No, no, wait, wait… Give me a second… Let me take my medication!

I know it sounds ridiculous if an equation complains of a disorder. How can you be an equation if you have a disorder, and how can you be in disorder if you are an equation? Well believe it or not, that’s exactly what I have been suffering from for such a long time. I am both orderly and disorderly; just like light is both wave and particle at the same time….

Hey, why are you looking at me like that? I told you to leave me alone. It was you who insisted on waiting and learning my secret. I don’t care if your designs are ruined or whatever. Actually, I’m the one who should be blamed. Why did I trust a person whom I met just a few minutes ago? I am like a fish that is eager to eat the worm on the hook. Such an idiot, I am…

Hello? Are you still there? I think I am losing my head again. Where are my pills?

Look, this is not easy for me to do, because in my routine life, people are obsessed with my equation aspect. And, they are passing this obsession from generation to generation. Every time I meet a young brain, my dream to finally meet an unconditioned mind fails. I am always too late to reach the fresh and eager minds. People always manage to find them before me, and instruct them to treat me as a well-established equation. No matter how much I want to show otherwise, they refuse to see my imperfect side, even if the experiments hit them in the face.

Why do they keep doing it? Much like a missionary, they are converting people into the belief of the Bernoulli Equation. I am telling you guys: I am bipolar, and I have imperfections, too!

What am I doing?! You are not going to believe me anyway. I am telling you my deepest secret, and making myself vulnerable as can be, but I still can’t wake you from a dream. You don’t want to wake up anyway; why would you? Do you have any other theory to believe in? Do you have another equation with which to orient yourself in an ocean of unknowns? Go on with your sleep, have nice dreams…

Unfortunately, I don’t have the same luxury as you. My continual tumbling between the two aspects of my reality never allows me to dream… Sometimes, I feel so energetic, so elated. I feel part of everything in the universe, and fall into an ecstasy by realizing that I contain everything in me. And the flow of time stops; we all become one and at peace with each other. No need to rush anywhere, no need to do anything… Just be…

But then my other side kicks in. I feel depressed under the burden of my duties and deadlines. I find myself in an ever faster pace of life, where there is no time to “just be”. There is always an action being commanded; there is always a motivation behind exchanges with others. The universe appears to be made of distinct individuals, like broken pieces of glass. Each is headed to a target of its own, unaware of any union. When life is filled with such a merciless momentum, what is more meaningful than getting rid of my life altogether?

Then, in that gloom, as my dizziness fades, my energetic side starts shining. By virtue of having been created in the same story, I focus on myself to read the universe. I realize that I carry the traits of anything and everything else around me. Once again, I start breathing the life that is gushing forth from me.

As I lose my conscience by getting high in life, I get stuck with the fact that losing my conscience defeats the purpose of being whole. You cannot hold onto the entities whose existence you fail to recognize. I start criticizing myself for disrespecting those around me. I blame myself for being such an addict and a loser; the shame of creation…

You see, there is no end to my ups and downs. As a remedy to these continuous head losses, I am using medications, but they have side effects. I am constantly growing fat, and losing my beauty. I hope one day, someone is going to be inspired with another equation that can take over my duties. Then I can retire from this bipolar life, and be mentioned in the scientific stories as a respectable grandparent…

The Bernoulli Equation given in its simplest form contains a pressure term (P) and a velocity term (1/2 (pV)^2), the sum of which is constant along a streamline:

P+1/2 pV^2=P_0

Thus, pressure and velocity work inversely with each other. As one increases, the other decreases.

The Bernoulli Equation can be derived in two independent ways. First, one can start with the conservation of energy (1st law of thermodynamics), and then follow some assumptions to end up with the Bernoulli Equation. Energy has a scale but no direction, and can be transformed from one form to another. Therefore, everything in the universe can essentially be converted into each other, just like the pressure and velocity terms in the Bernoulli Equation.

The second way to reach the Bernoulli Equation is based on the momentum equation (Newton’s second law). Again using few assumptions, one can achieve the nice and simple Bernoulli Equation. Unlike energy, momentum has both scale and direction. Any changes to this directionality require a forceful interaction between two objects.

Having its base on two fundamental laws of physics, hence reflecting both energy and momentum, makes the Bernoulli Equation one of the strongest and most beautiful equations of science, but not perfect!

The underlying theory of the Bernoulli Equation requires that the density (p) of the fluid be constant – in other words, incompressible. Therefore, the Bernoulli Equation fails to accurately explain the flow of gases at high speeds, which involves density changes. Similarly, the effects of viscosity are neglected in the foundations of the Bernoulli Equation. This means that the variation of pressure and velocity near a solid object cannot be explained by the Bernoulli Equation.

As a result of these imperfections, the Bernoulli Equation describes a fluid as a pile of metal sheets, and explains a flow as the sliding and bending of these metal sheets around each other. Clearly, this is not what a fluid is and not what happens in a real flow. Therefore, predictions of the Bernoulli Equation are inherently wrong, especially when there are sharp turns or obstructions in the way of the fluid.

In order to compensate for some of these deficiencies, a concept known as head loss (hloss) is introduced. Head loss is experimentally measured and then artificially added to the Bernoulli Equation, which then becomes:

P+1/2 pV^2+pgh_(loss,turns)+pgh_(loss,obstructions)+pgh_(loss,wall shear)=P_0

The final result is an equation that is useful but repulsively oversized, and it is certainly not well-established in theory.

The answer was interesting and had deep meanings, but still left questions in my mind. The creatures were told: a new species will be created and arrive soon, and each member of this species will be equivalent and worthy of a whole species.

Those who asked the question were silent, suggesting they were satisfied with the answer. But I wondered how a single member of a species can be worth an entire species – and whether destroying a whole species for a new one can really be just.

Here, it was obvious to me that the new species that would be created is humans, and those condemned were the species who went extinct in ancient times, before humanity appeared on earth. This dream vaguely reminded me something that I read in the “Risale-i Nur Collection” by Bediuzzaman Said Nursi.

Bediuzzaman remarkably states that, “A human being is equivalent to a species of other creatures” (Zuhra – 4th point, Isharat al-I’jaz, and Mathnawi al-Nuriya). This line hadn’t really struck me until I had the dream about older creatures questioning this wisdom.

In this dream, those creatures were dinosaurs. I was not scared; they weren’t threatening with their question. They were fighting for their rights and trying to understand the glorious plan, and beyond.

It seemed to me a lovely coincidence that I had a visit to Washington coming up soon and had a chance to visit the National Museum of Natural History, where you can see well preserved remnants of various dinosaurs.

All of the dinosaurs went extinct long before the first human showed up. Dinos first walked on earth over 200 million years ago and dominated the earth until 66 million years ago. Their dominion on earth ended with the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction. According to fossil records, there were more than 1000 dinosaur species. Dinosaurs had different habits of eating, as some were herbivorous (plant-eating) and others were carnivorous (meat-eating), including fish-eaters and insectivores, and omnivores (including both animals and plants in their diets). We should be thankful that we never knew many of the carnivores like T-Rex, which measured up to 12m (40ft)! It’s obvious that we could not live on earth if T-Rex were still running around. For our arrival, their departure was necessary.

There is no doubt that the human species is very valuable from various aspects, but what puts each person on the same level with another species?

One of humanity’s great merits is our collective understanding. This collective consciousness can be more fully realized through the glasses of faith in God. With the window of faith, humans not only comprehend His speech, but are better attuned to their fellow living beings – and maybe even non-living creatures. Humans are like one who is that all-inclusive and hears all other things. Hence, we can grasp proofs of the most beautiful names of the Creator from the speeches of all creatures.

The light of such understanding in humans leads to an expansion and improvement in our soul. This makes our value high, our sight universal, and our ability to achieve to perfection limitless. On the other hand, many other species are limited in many aspects by their nature, sights, and capacity of perfection. According to religious texts, though humans and other species are valued differently on earth, the divide grows larger in the hereafter. While every human being is re-created with their names, features, matter, and manner, other species return back to the soil.

When you visit nature museum next time, try to listen what the fossils of extinct species tell you about their complaint. They were created for a purpose; they have finished their job and gone. They have done a fantastic job and flourished, while leaving us many petrol reservoirs. Though countless species have gone extinct, more than 1.6 million other species are still living on earth. Death is not an end; nowadays, they are trying to reach out to us and tell us their secrets. We’re expected to become the best fruit of this universe.

This dream made me think about how the ways that Allah could teach us is not limited to what we do when we are awake. Would you ever think that ancient extinct species would also need the lights of the everlasting speech of the All-Wise and All-Powerful, as explained by why a man could be equivalent and worthy of a species of another creature by Bediuzzaman?

Another lesson is that as we live in an oil dependent-century, we are counting on reservoirs that formed millions years ago by the remnants of ancient living beings; but just as we depend on them, ancient extinct species are also counting on us and expecting us to contemplate our purpose for being here, and to show that we’re worthy of being the most glorious fruit in the universe. As the All-wise make things with infinite wisdom, he sends oil to people of this century to help in technology and he also sends further mercy in the form of knowledgeable scholars to answer our questions.

Dream, Believe, Fly. These three words have a ring, a truth, a purity. As an author of books for teen readers, I gave these three words to one of my characters, and these three words became her mantra. She was sixteen; I am more. The motto works for both of us. My character had those words tattooed onto her skin; I have them tattooed into my soul. Dream. Believe. Fly.

The first step to achieving is to dream. You need to see, you need to dream, you need to believe. Faith and fervor result in the necessary work, and the work gives you wings. The wind beneath those wings is the dream, the belief, the need to achieve.

We are given one life. Some of us live soft; some live hard. Some laugh a lot; some cry. Some are brave; some are not. Some live many years; some live few. At the age of fifty-five, I’ve seen many friends leave this earth, and I’ve learned that we need to seize not only the moment, but our dreams. We need to seize our dreams, grab onto them, and never forget what we hope to accomplish in this world. We need to seize first, then to believe. We need to believe with all of our hearts, with all of our minds, with all of our very beings. We are each instilled with the magic to make things happen. We are resilient and we are strong and we have the power inside, if only we dream and we believe that we can indeed fly.

I’ve wanted to write ever since I can remember. My first memory of elementary school is that of the library, and of a pink Mary Poppins book that I reached up to pull from the shelf. Mary Poppins could fly, and this much I believed: So could I.

It would be many years, though, before I got my wings. There would be hardships and hurt, suffering and struggles. There would be days of hard work, and nights of worry. There would be dark nights when I could not see the stars; days when I tried to believe that life might get easier with time.

“When a man can observe himself suffering and is able, later, to describe what he’s gone through, it means he was born for literature.” A writer named Edouard Bourdet said that in 1927. Many years later, those words still speak to this writer’s soul.

1989 was a rough year. I was 31 years old, and my motto at that time might have been “Hang in there.” I was hit by a drunk driver in July. He left me by the roadside with injuries, a demolished car, and a shattered faith in mankind. He went to jail; I went home to heal.

Two months later, my stepson’s biological mother deposited him on our doorstep. He was six years old, and all he had in the world was a trash bag stuffed with his earthly possessions. He awakened sobbing every night. With my own six-year-old son from a previous marriage, I couldn’t comprehend how a mother’s heart could be so cold.

Two months after my stepson came to us, I unexpectedly became pregnant. I still had no car, and was undergoing treatment for persistent neck and back injuries incurred by the accident. We were poor. My stepson was aching and confused. So was I. Hang in there. Hang in there hang in there hang in there.

In the middle of the pregnancy, I contracted Fifth Disease, a form of the measles. There was an outbreak in the elementary schools of our area, and the medical community was unsure as to the effects of the illness in pregnant women. I was sent for a level two ultrasound, and told by the doctors that I could be “cautiously optimistic” for a healthy baby. However, I’d need a weekly ultrasound. If the fetus contracted the disease or showed signs of anemia, it would be necessary to undergo a blood transfusion in utero. The risks, I was told, were stillbirth and miscarriage. Oh, please, please. Hang in there.

On the day before our baby was due, my husband John came home from work, weeping. It was August of 1990, and the Gulf War and recession had resulted in a permanent lay-off from his longtime construction job. It was the first (and only) time I saw him cry. His heart was broken.

Our son was born: a perfectly healthy and beautiful baby boy. We were ecstatic, despite the fact that John didn’t have a job and we were living in a cramped mobile home with three children: his, mine, and ours.

“Maybe I should get a real job,” I said. “Give up this crazy dream of writing books.” I was an established newspaper and magazine writer, but had been attempting futilely to break into the competitive world of children’s books.

“Keep at it,” John said. “Don’t give up.” Don’t give up. Another three words to grasp onto. So I didn’t. I didn’t give up. I stayed home and wrote, raising our children and grasping tight to my hopes. I prayed for the strength to continue writing despite the obstacles and staggering odds. Don’t give up. Hang in there. Don’t give up.

Several weeks after our son Zach was born, John saw an ad in a local paper: “Old Barn: Free For The Taking-Down.”

John took the barn apart, piece-by-piece, and found that there was a market for the materials. The boards and beams, windows and doors and weather vanes were all sold. The barn would live on for another hundred years, in a hundred different places. It was

the beginning of John’s own business, but we still didn’t have much money. One writer and one self-employed Barn Saver plus three children is an equation that doesn’t always equal promptly-paid bills. Don’t give up. Hang in there.

When Zach was two months old, I began writing a novel for pre-teen children. Working on an ancient and clattering typewriter, I used the kitchen table for my desk. I plugged away on the typewriter as Zach dozed contentedly in his swing. Through the window of our mobile home, I could see the green Welsh Mountain of Pennsylvania. This mountain would be the setting of the book. The main character, Maizie, was a girl who’d been abandoned by her mother. She was hurting. Maizie had lots of wishes, but life was rough. I knew: I’d used bits and pieces of my own. But still, Maizie had hope. Someday, somehow, everything would be okay. Don’t give up. Hang in there.

The book Maizie would be published five years later, in 1995. In the meanwhile, I wrote a picture book based on John’s work of dismantling and recycling old barns. The book – Barn Savers – was published in 1999 and was honored by the American Library Association’s Booklist Journal by being named Top Of The List, Best Picture Book of 1999. It was also lauded as a Notable Book in the Language Arts by the National Council of Teachers of English, as well as short-listed for the Bill Martin Jr. Picture Book Award in Kansas and the Keystone State Reading award. A mention of the book appeared in the pages of People Magazine.

Since then, I’ve written about twenty more books. I went back to college at the age of fifty, and earned an MFA in Writing. I got to travel to Italy, because of my writing. I taught on cruise ships, and I taught in a medieval castle on a hilltop in Tuscany. I was honored in England in 2012 with a short story prize, and I got to travel to the U.K. for the first time, staying in the dorms of Oxford University. Dream, Believe, Fly.

Somewhere around the time that I changed from forty-nine to fifty, somewhere around the time that I applied to Vermont College and was accepted, that was the time that I changed my motto for life. I still believe in “Hang In There” and “Don’t Give Up.” But those words never held the power, the faith, the magic that my new motto does.

I had to get a student loan in order to go to school, and that was scary. I kept repeating my motto, though, as I waded through the mounds of paperwork and forms and red tape. “Dream. Believe. Fly. You are Linda Oatman High and you love to write. Dream, believe, fly. You only get one life. Now is the time. Dreambelievefly.”

Our youngest son went through some struggles in his teenage years. We got through them. He’s still finding his path in life, at the age of 23. As long as he dreams, as long as he believes … he will indeed fly.

The kids are now grown, and I’m on my way to growing old. I’m fifty-five. I love my life. It’s hard at times; it’s fun at others. But it’s always mine, and we only get one life.

I’m now a grandmother, and I hope to instill the things that I’ve learned in my grandchildren. I hope that they find the strength and the courage and the faith to dream. I pray that they believe.

And I know, I know, I know in my soul … they will fly.

Linda Oatman High is an author/playwright/poet/journalist (www.lindaoatmanhigh.com) who lives in Lancaster County, PA and teaches everywhere.

In order to find your new self in tranquility

As you transformed, the sanctuary became the enemy

Demolishing your home turned out to be your first duty

Don’t worry, you will be okay

You didn’t belong there anyway

Embrace life, or else you will be cast away

Remember, you have only a single day

You are now like a newborn star in dreams

Behold your beauty and elegant limbs

Feel the air flow by you, flip your wings

Taste the drops of life on the leaves

I wish I were you, just like a baby

My smiles could buy world’s sympathy

And my cries would enslave everybody

Each day, sailing towards a new discovery

But, what is it that you are still searching in pain?

Don’t tell me all this splendor is in vain

You are a blossom in the air, don’t be insane

I cannot reason your ceaseless disdain

Oh butterfly, you have woken me up

Is this face mine or is it makeup

Or, am I you in my dream? Reality is messed up

After a life-long delusion, I need a clean up

I am now seeking a beauty

One that I saw in a dream I don’t remember

From one flower to another, alas I cannot find it.

I am starving, how am I going to survive?

But my yearning for the beauty becomes my food.

A beauty whose absence is so powerful,

I cannot even imagine reunion with it,

A beauty that is with me, but I am far from it.

Seth Mette is a professor of aerospace engineering

There are many examples of inspirations in history. Sometimes it comes with a dream, as it happened to famous chemist, Friedrich Kekule (1829-1896), helping him to make one of the most amazing discoveries of his time. He saw atoms in his dream whirling, dancing and reassembling themselves in a snake-like motion, and the snake snapping its own tail. This dream provided him with the inspiration to discover the benzene ring. Benzene, a colorless and highly flammable liquid, is an important industrial solvent in the production of drugs, plastics, and dyes. Kekule is not the only person who found inspiration to an important question in his dream. For example, Otto Loewi, a famous German scientist, was inspired by a dream about an experiment that became the foundation for the theory of chemical transmission of the nervous impulse and led to a Nobel Prize. Once you contemplate on a question long enough, it becomes an important part of your life. You start seeing things in a different way, and everything becomes related to that question.

Ten years ago, a close friend of mine asked me a very interesting question. He said, “Did you ever read or witness any inspiration from Holy Scriptures, like the Qur’an, pointing to the Internet? After this question, I started to think deeply about the texts I had read, or the things I saw in my environment, and selected my readings more carefully. This helped me to capture more inspirations from my life.

It did not take long for me to relate many verses from scriptures to the question posed by my friend. It was an easy process to go backwards from the result to the possible starting ideas (verses). The hard thing about inspiration is that both the starting point and the result are unknown. Once we know the result that we wanted to achieve, it is easy to relate many things and find similarities around us that might get us to the same point. This can be either a scientific fact or a religious belief.

The relationship between science and religion, and inspirations from scriptures are the two most common controversial topics. Science and religion are the two strongest forces influencing humans. Some people use science to justify religious claims, while others start from religious information to reach unknown scientific points. Both approaches have many challenges, and may lead to consequences that conflict with one’s belief. Scriptures can help us think outside of the box, and provide many inspirations for science. However, it is important to keep the balance between both worlds, while working hard on understanding science and building our faith on a solid ground.

So, how did I find the verses that pointed to the idea of the Internet in the Scriptures? I started to think of the core properties that make up the Internet. What will be my first words if I wanted to define the Internet? Some of the key definitions or features of the Internet that came to my mind was “a world-wide network of computers,” “connecting people to each other,” “storing or accessing world of information,” “removing physical boundaries,” “easy and cheap communication,” or “freedom of speech.”

Which feature of the Internet would sound too intricate to ever exist a thousand years ago? Probably, the possibility of storing and accessing all the information available throughout the history of mankind would be the most challenging feature. We haven’t reached that point with the Internet yet, but so much ground has been covered towards this goal. Let’s see how much progress is made on this road of storage and retrieval.

Wikipedia, a free web-based multilingual encyclopedia project, has over 22 million articles (over four million in the English Wikipedia). There are roughly 40 million books in US libraries. Google is building the largest online library in the history of the world, and already scanned over 20 million books. ISI Web of Knowledge, an online scientific database, is a source for thousands of journals with millions of articles published from 1900s to present. Everything published in the last couple of centuries becoming available online from handwritten books to newspaper archives, magazines, and journals.

Chemistry databases list information (e.g. structures, spectra, reactions, syntheses, and thermo-physical data) for tens of millions of organic and inorganic compounds known to man that are used in various industries. Biological databases provide information (e.g. gene sequences, textual descriptions, attributes and ontology classifications, citations, and tabular data) for living and even extinct organisms.

Besides the published information, other types of data from various types of arts, music and picture libraries are becoming an important part of the Internet. More and more museums provide virtual galleries that make all paintings, sculptures and other art pieces accessible to remote users. E-government projects make personal records, health and financial data of all citizens available to related parties. More personal information is available online through personal blogs, image galleries, video sharing, and discussion forums.

Could you make a person, fifty years or even fourteen hundred years ago, believe that one day all the information would be available in a book, a box or a device? This was my starting point to find clues about the Internet in the scriptures. This journey led to many interesting ideas and understanding of my environment. In the middle of the search, the Holy Qur’an provided an important message to summarize this journey:

“With clear arguments and scriptures; and We have revealed to you the Reminder, that you may explain clearly to men what is sent for them, and that they may think and reflect.” (Qur’an 16:44)

As an explanation to this verse, Ibn Mas`ud, the sixth person to embrace Islam, said “[Allah] made it clear that in this Qur’an there is complete knowledge of and about everything.” The Holy Qur’an contains many verses about events in the past and future, what is lawful and unlawful, and information about the religion, our life in this world, and our destiny in the afterlife. Divinely inspired Scriptures, Prophets, and laws were sent successively, in part as an assurance of the true knowledge.

Fethullah Gülen, a Turkish Muslim scholar, lists the types of knowledge and understanding as follows; “… that is based on beholding or actively seeing something, inner (comprehensive knowledge) or outer (description and measurement), implementation of the lesser understanding (technology) or of the spiritual understanding (contemplation and worship, which yield wisdom), learning and teaching, self-based or other-based, the learner’s or teacher’s belief in independence of action or being, and of the believer’s surrender and trust to the Creator …” [1]. We need to learn how to “read” the universe and scriptures consciously to acquire true understanding and wisdom.

My search for the inspiration for an idea of the Internet led me to find many verses from the Holy Qur’an. Here are some of the verses that I personally think is a starting point to inspire the idea of storing all the information known to mankind.

“… there is not a grain in the darkness (or depths) of the earth, nor anything fresh or dry (green or withered), but is (inscribed) in a clear record (to those who can read)” (Qur’an 6:59)

“… nor is hidden from the Lord (so much as) the weight of an atom on the earth or in heaven. And not the smallest and not the greatest of these things but are recorded in a clear record” (Qur’an 10:61)

“… and there is nothing hidden, in heaven or earth, but is (recorded) in a clear record” (Quran 27:75)

These verses can be interpreted in different ways. Some scholars refer these verses to the knowledge of the All-Knowing God, or a book called Lawh al-Mahfuz that stores the information on the destiny of mankind. Actually relating these verses with the Internet, and the traditional interpretations have a very interesting connection. With ever-growing capacity and capabilities, the Internet is like a small book of destiny that stores our everyday life. However, it is far from storing every single event in the universe. This helps us to realize how mighty and vast the knowledge of the God is, and the capacity of Lawh al-Mahfuz.

When I recited the verses from Qur’an that related to the idea of the Internet, my friend was surprised. As in this example, scientific discoveries and inspirations can be connected with the verses from the Qur’an in many ways. It is important to make this connection for the greater good. Gülen says, “… Recent scientific discoveries have clarified certain Qur’anic verses. Such advances in knowledge occur successively, as the universe proceeds upon its decreed course and in the measure of understanding appointed for us. We must acknowledge and praise the efforts and achievements of researchers and scientists, but they should not lead us to ingratitude and insolence (the roots of unbelief). Rather, we should reaffirm our dependence upon the Creator for guidance both in our quest for and application of knowledge…” [1]. There is no doubt that the Qur’an drives us to deep thoughts, creativity, inspirations and great ideas.

Our further discussion raised another important question, “What is the purpose of reading scriptures?” To know why we read scriptures is as important as reading itself. The Qur’an explains the meaning of reading and draws attention to creation [2] by saying: “Read, in the name of your Lord, Who created” [Qur’an 96:1]. The Qur’an suggests us to observe the universe and learn from its laws and processes so we do not repeat the mistakes of the previous generations, and instead, build a better future.

Acknowledgment: This article was produced at MERGEOUS [3], an online article and project development service for authors and publishers dedicated to the advancement of technologies in the merging realm of science and religion.

Halil I. Demir is an internet entrepreneur and freelance writer.

References

1. Gülen, Fethullah. Questions and Answers about Islam, NJ: The Light, Inc.
2. Gülen. Fethullah Religious Education of the Child, NJ: The Light, Inc.
3. Mergeous, http://www.mergeous.com

It was 3 o’clock in the morning. The rain outside beat on the windows and the loud thunder ripped through the night. A loud knock on the door startled the boy. All alone in the mansion, he was not really expecting anyone this late. But the stranger insistently knocked on the door. The boy got up hesitantly and grabbed the doorknob with shaking hands… Flash forward. He woke up with a scream, drenched in a pool of sweat. “Thank God, it was all a dream.”

I turned off the TV, feeling a mix of boredom and hunger gnawing hunger at the pit of my stomach. I headed down to the kitchen to grab a bite.

The world is full of wonders. We are amazed at how fish swim or how birds fly; by imitating their systems, we attempt to swim or fly. One of our most precious attributes is curiosity. Once I attended an exhibition associated with a popular movie. I was amazed at the power of human imagination and the dreams it can conjure, turning them into reality. The props and costumes used in this movie were displayed lavishly for the curious eyes of the fans and the flash of the cameras. We, as human beings, were being entertained with the products of the human imagination. Even the flow of events that happened at the exhibition, the flashing cameras, the décor and costumes, which seemed so important at that time, were all a design of the human imagination; they were not real. As the actors and actresses took on the personalities of their characters, they not only assumed the role of a movie character, but also became a player in a man-made dream world. We followed the entertainment with curiosity and interest. The characters, the story, the costumes, the light, and sound: all this captivated our attention. As the glow of the entertainment slowly faded off, I began to feel that this popular movie and even the exhibition itself existed within another movie… a more real movie in which we all played our roles.

My favorite pieces in the exhibition were the “magically alive” animated portraits. I couldn’t help but smile when I saw the people in the portraits applauding us, as if we had accomplished some feat. I liked the idea of animated portraits and photos. A picture is ultimately just a 2D image, but an animated image encompasses a third dimension: time. A movie’s ability to capture the charm of time is what appeals to us and captivates our attention.

Early in the morning, I glanced out my window and noticed the autumn leaves falling from the tree in my back yard. About two or three weeks ago they were all green, but now the scene had completely changed. Tinted with different shades of orange, yellow, red and purple, the leaves ruffled on their branches with the whoosh of the light breeze.

I imagined that my window was an animated picture inside my home. There was someone insistently striking His brush against my easel, coloring this picture day by day, moment by moment, and giving it motion for me, making me feel the changes He brought about. Filled with these wondrous thoughts, words fell out of my mouth: “He is truly a magnificent artist.” At the moment, I recalled what the lead character in a movie had said as he looked, bewildered at the harmony of colors in the sky during sunset: “God must have been an artist.”

In order to make an animated picture or create a video sequence, the consecutive pictures or “frames” of a scene must be joined together. If the difference between the capture times of two consecutive frames is too long, the video will not run smoothly, stuttering like an old silent film, with intermittent flickers. Modern day movies use a larger number of frames per unit of time. The greater the number of frames, the smoother the images will appear. When I focused my attention on this outside “movie,” a movie in which I was an actress along with the rest of humanity, I couldn’t help but wonder what the number of frames was. Since we are living in a “perfect” movie, the movie of our world that we see through our eyes everyday must have an infinite number of frames. I contently followed the descent of a snowflake onto my hand. It made me admit once again that we’re part of a great cinematography and screenplay. The producer is not only an artist who covertly paints the pictures with His gentle brush strokes, but is also someone who strings an infinite number of picture frames with great skill and attention to detail, creating the perfect animation of “life.”

Imagine the animation of a falling bird feather; one would need to perform an enormous number of calculations between the sequences of frames. It would be necessary to run many computers in parallel to be able to process such animation in real time. Then I used this same information and applied it to the scene of the falling snowflake. Contemplating the details of each moment within that scenario and considering each moment to be a single frame helps you appreciate the complicated task of stringing these frames together in real time.

When you see a man inscribing circles with a light source you actually see a circle of a light. In fact, you perceive it as a circle because of the speed and the continuity of the motion. Life is analogous to that imaginary circle; it exists because of the continuity of the artist’s efforts. Yes, life as a “perfect” movie is similar to the continuity of this circle of light, because the artist’s magnificent skills continuously color and illuminate each picture frame, stringing them together in a perfect fashion.

Wait, wait, it doesn’t end here. I close my eyes; it is easy for me to see things that happened years ago in all their details. The time I dropped my ice cream on my favorite shirt when I was five, the gift that my brother gave me on my thirteenth birthday, the day I graduated from college… like a movie, I can watch all these whenever I like. This illustrates another issue in video processing, storing the videos, in other words, the frames, in an efficient way so that they can be accessed promptly when needed. I already have a good technique to store the story of my life in my memories. Moreover, in order to remember any sequence, all I need to do is just remember a small detail of the time, an event, or a memento. This is the fastest content-based image retrieval system I have ever seen! No moment of life is wasted and all is saved somewhere, providing relief for the human heart, which is helplessly attracted to eternity. Any art necessitates an exhibition and an audience. Then there must be a place and a time in which the whole movie will be watched again by the audience.

My brain not only stores my memories as videos, but also creates videos as I dream. These are mostly movies in the making; because I can do everything in my dreams, they do not need to be logical. I heard the phrase “Dream Theater” and I smiled. What else can one call a dream other than a grand theater full of surprises? Moreover, although the length of time that a dream takes up is not that long, it still contains a sizeable story that takes up days of real life. It’s one rabbit warren inside another.

As the rain hits the Boston ground, I look outside my window at my moving picture. Through this open window, I also hear the pitter-patter of the falling rain. The smell of wet soil seeps into my room. I shut my eyes and I can repaint the entire picture, using nothing but sounds and smell. What kind of magic is this? I cannot stop myself as I think about Him, the Producer of the real movie of my very existence. After all, I know that He loves me. No matter how busy I am watching man-made movies inside the real movie, I feel the presence of the true artist always with me and the imprint of His ever-lasting art in every moment of my life.

“Mom! Mom, wake up!” I cried shaking her by her shoulders, determined to stop her dreaming before something terrible happened to the boy.

Mom sat up robotically, opened her eyes, and as the contours of her room sat in place under the moonlight, she took a deep breath and urged me back to sleep. Alas, I spent the rest of the night wondering who the lost boy was. Was it my brother, the only son in our family? Did the dream mean that something bad would happen to him?

Although my curiosity almost killed me like the proverbial cat, I dared not ask Mom about the dream which continued visiting her in the following months. For one thing, dreams good or bad were never told in our family. Mom believed that if you put a dream into words, if you articulated it even in a whisper, you pronounced an undeniable invitation for the dream to become true.

“Dreams,” Mom often said, “should be left alone. Dreams are tricky. Everything you see in them stand for something else in the real world. Rats stand for money, money for gossip, crack and holes in houses for deaths in the household.”

So I kept my peace and never talked with anyone about the matter.

One day, long after that night, I was looking for a dear necklace of mine which I couldn’t find, having hidden it too well for my own good. As it often happens, if you look into all possible hiding places in a household, you are bound to find unexpected things—like your sister’s secret diary in the wardrobe or your brother’s savings under the mattress. But what are the chances that you will find pictures of a brother you never knew!

At first, I couldn’t make sense of those two pictures. One was a photo of a baby in his crib with eyes half open and the other was a shot of the same baby with Mom, in her younger years, leaning over the crib as if to place a kiss on the baby’s face. Mom’s face seemed so sad that I wanted to tear up the photo right there.

I went to my older sister instead and asked her, “Who is this baby?” My sister snatched the photos from me and reproachfully said, “Why can’t just you leave anything alone?”

She immediately headed toward mom’s bedroom, apparently knowing the hiding place. Then she stopped midway and replied without turning around, “He is our brother. He died from a fever when he was ten months old. And don’t ask Mom about him. After all these years, she still cries when she speaks of him.”

A tender feeling of longing, gripped my heart. “What was his name?” I asked.

“Leonard,” she replied. “He would have been fifteen-years-old now, had he lived.”

I wanted to take another look at the photos and stroke with my fingers the little face of my brother, but I dreaded my sister’s anger. She went into Mom’s bedroom and closed the door shut.

On the days that followed, I started fantasizing about what it would have been like for me to have another brother, four years older. I imagined us going to school together, his arm on my shoulder, me proud of my protective brother, daring the bullies to come even closer.

I imagined covering up for him when he came home late and he telling me first, before anyone else, about the girl whom he loved. I smiled as tears welled up in my eyes when I thought of those happy moments that never came to pass. It was then that I willed myself to believe death couldn’t be the end of all things. A sweet hope invaded my heart that one day I would see him, hug him, and catch up on missed happiness.

I wanted so much to share this hope with Mom so that she could accept her loss, so that her nightmares would stop tormenting her, so that those two photos would come out of hiding and join the light in the family album. But I never had the courage to confront her grief. I had understood by then that no matter how many living children a mother has, her heart will always mourn the death of a child.

One afternoon, five years later, I overheard my aunt talking in low tones to Mom. “He would have been twenty years old today,” she said while she stroked Mom’s hand in sympathy.

“It’s kismet!” Mom said, taking a deep breath. “It’s the destiny.” Her voice quavered, but she did not cry. “It wasn’t meant to be.”

After this, the photos came out of hiding and took their place on my mom’s dresser. Yet, Mom’s nightmares did not vanish. They continued to torture her. One thing remained a mystery to me. Why did Mom never ask, “Where is my boy?” It was always the boy? And during all these years, why hadn’t she uttered his name in her dream even once?

Every time I heard her search in the darkness of the night for the nameless boy, I wanted to whisper into her subconscious before waking her up, “Mom, you have to let things go. It wasn’t your fault. It wasn’t meant to be.” But I never did. ***

Tonight, Mom is having another of her nightmares, but I won’t wake her up as I have before. I watch her turn in her sleep, hoping that her dream, left undisturbed this time, will relieve her from the burden of her conscience. Tonight, I know Mom is looking for some other boy. One she doesn’t dare to own.

We were talking this afternoon about how life had changed for her and Dad after each of us, their children had married and left home. Mom didn’t enjoy her empty nest as much as one would expect.

“People always remarked that my five children were too much for any normal person to handle, but look at us now,” she said, taking in the tidy and spotless living room. “The house is quite, empty, just me and your Dad and… the memories. It would have been nice to have another child for our senior years, someone who would tie us to life with bittersweet worries.”

A wave of sadness covered her face, a feeling of regret I couldn’t quite grasp. Did she remember Leonard? But he still wouldn’t have been the child of my parents’ senior years. What else?

“It wasn’t meant to be,” I said insinuating on his death. “Destiny.” Mom’s eyes watered and her voice trembled. “Sometimes you pick your destiny.”

“But what could you do? The doctors couldn’t reduce his fever and…”

“I am not talking about Leonard,” she interrupted and then paused in pain. Seeing my shock, Mom, with great difficulty, told the story of her last child. While listening to her, I realized that a house cannot hold enough hiding places for the secrets of the past.

“When you were nine years old, I discovered I was pregnant again,” Mom continued.

“Everybody was so against the idea of me giving birth to that baby. Your father worried about our already strained finances. My doctor warned me about the difficulties of a labor at forty-one. Your eldest sister, who was newly engaged at that time, complained of how ashamed she would feel to tell her fiancé’s family that her mother was pregnant when it was her own time to have children. My friends told me that women my age often gave birth to children with disabilities. I felt so helpless and scared, so alone.” She let out a sigh.

Gathering her strength, she continued. “People push you to take one definitive step and leave you to bear the burden alone afterwards. It was hard for me. I regretted it the moment it was done.” Mom sniffed and closed her eyes, struggling for a deep breath.

“As I was about to leave the hospital, the nurse told me the baby was a boy. It was then that I remembered Leonard, my son whom I had lost in infancy. I know, it sounds crazy, but at that moment I felt as if the soul of Leonard had made a second attempt to come to this world, to my arms, and I had brutally rejected him.”

Mom couldn’t continue any longer. Her chest was heaving for air. I took her hand and stroked it lovingly. Who of us hasn’t done things that we terribly regret? Don’t the tears of remorse expiate the past? Shouldn’t we forgive ourselves as we are asked to forgive others? Mom listened, nodded, but she did not speak a word. She excused herself and went to her room. Tonight as I lay in the dark by her side, I pray Mom will find the boy in her dream, present her tears to him, and find peace in reconciliation.

from the memoirs of an inventor that lived long, long ago

I especially love when the spider webs shine with the sunrise. The little water beads on them make an extraordinary scene in the early morning. Talking about spiders, how they make their webs is also another beauty. It still blows my mind that they can make such long arches despite their tiny bodies. With the colorful designs on their bodies, spiders are the manifestation of beauty that penetrates even into the smallest holes of the earth. As I am talking about spiders, I would like to tell you a lovely memory of mine about how my admiration of them led me to the discovery of my life.

At the time, there was not much to do other than hunting and picking leaves and fruit. I wanted to do something else. For example, the skins that animals had on them were so fitting, flexible, and nice. We used to take them to put on ourselves; but they did not fit us. They did not cover our bodies totally, and they were stinky. I had a desire to come up with a new way of covering our bodies. I used to sit by the spiders and reflect on this idea a lot while watching them make their webs.

Unfortunately, not everyone was appreciative of the spiders and my interest in them. Whenever my father caught me watching the spiders, he used to mock me and reprimand me for being lazy. He always told me that we needed to get going to hunt something edible, in order not to sleep with empty bellies. You can imagine what torture it was for me to hunt. Killing something of beauty is not beautiful… I knew we had to eat to survive. But maybe I was not the right person to do the killing part. I could cook, I could pick fruit…

One day, when I was watching a spider, I saw a cocoon hanging down from the tree. That was it! The cocoon’s cover was what I was looking for: a large spider web woven densely enough to cover us up. You should have seen me when the idea first came. I couldn’t help but smile so broadly. It had been a long time since I had smiled such a joyous smile. I started running and climbed the hills. To get some rest, I watched the valleys below. Then, once again I took off, and soared down from the hill running; my arms wide open like a bird’s wings.

When I came home, empty-handed to be sure, my mother was not happy at all. “If you don’t want your dad to ruin your night, go and find something before he comes,” she said. Fortunately, I knew some trees that were in fruit just then. I rushed to gather from them to make everybody happy.

Later that night, I had a very scary dream. I was running, and then I suddenly fell into a pit where there was a long snake. The snake started to wind itself around me so that I was totally covered. Then I saw that there was a scorpion in the pit, but it could not approach me because of the snake. Frightened, I woke up screaming. My parents came in to check on me. After a second’s silence, my father said, “I told you not to watch those spiders too much.”

Although I was not really bothered, my parents were getting more and more concerned about me. I was growing to the age of marriage, and they wanted me to have sound spiritual health. The next day, we went to the respected man of God in the village for him to interpret my dream and to get some advice. He said, “The snake in your dream did not harm you. So, it is to be hoped that God will bless you with a cover that is going to protect you from worldly and heavenly harms.” This interpretation was definitely unexpected both by me and by my parents.

Soon after that dream, I talked about my inspiration to my mother, and she told me something invaluable. She said that our great great-grandparents had had beautiful things to wear before they came to this world. When they were sent down here, their beautiful clothes were ripped off. Now that I was thinking about making beautiful garments, maybe this was a heavenly message. Mom wanted me to keep this secret.

I did keep my hopes and inspirations secret, but I did not stop working on them. I was finally inspired by another creature: birds. They made their nests by weaving plants and branches together. That observation brought me to the brim of the discovery of my life, but I was not aware of it at the time.

One day, mom wanted to have a private conversation with me. She said that now I was not a girl anymore but a young woman it was time that I united my life with someone else’s. She said that the guests that had come a few days earlier had come to talk about that issue. They asked my parents for me. At first, I was perplexed to hear all this. I wanted to have some time to prepare myself for the idea. Not long after, the preparations for the wedding were underway, and I was very willing because of the person asking for me.

My groom was the man of God that had interpreted my dream. To suit his status, I wanted to wear something special on the day of the wedding, something never seen before. The days were running by too fast, and bothered by my inability to come up with that special thing, I started spending more time with the spider webs by myself. Mom thought that a gloomy state had befallen on me due to my prospective wedding. She tried to reassure me, calm me, but that was not the case at all. As my state persisted, my parents’ worries grew too. They did not want any trouble in this wedding.

Then one day, I received the first gift for my wedding, before the wedding actually happened. I was inspired to weave the leaves and stems of plants to cover myself just like the winding of that snake in my dream and the cocoon of the spider. With the joy of this heavenly gift, I quickly finished making my garment. This discovery was certainly a heavenly beauty that was sent to celebrate my wedding. With the new garment on me, I was so beautiful, and with the man of my life, I was so happy.

Seth Mette has a PhD in Aerospace Engineering and is currently working as a postdoctoral fellow at West Virginia University. He has a special interest in psychological fiction.