I happen to find an article that bears the name of my maternal cousin sister HYE. I often heard about stories about her infancy, etc., but she as an adult is beyond and above me. The article is in the form of public speech. The speaker quotes my cousin's words, that is "Young people! Already imagine your dream. In my case, I always imagine my dream. And meanwhile, my dream becomes fulfilled, realized. I find myself actualizing my dream." There may be many namesakes, but the chance is rare to find two people with the same name and the same title (prosecutor.)

I wonder what her dream was. Based on the inside stories I heard secondhand, I can guess. But I imagine her dream must have been very powerful and enduring. I used to talk about dreams when I was seventeen years old. She realizes her dream at her thirtieth birthday, I think. She is seven years older than I. She is the same birthyear as Hong Jung Wook's. I'm so lonely, but it's so wonderful that she is related to me gratuitously by birth. It's indisoluable, irrefutable fact, as she once told me. There are so many bright stars in the sky. I aim at one star, and draw my arrow as hard as I can in order to target and to focus my attention on it. I let go of my arrow, but it shoots skyward a while. I see it flying overhead, but soon it returns right back to myself like a boomerang. The arrow I shoot in the sky hits me in the head. But my cousin is still hung somewhere in the sky. I can point at her with my finger and rightfully call her my cousin. Mother always praises her. When our grandmother passed away when she was 90 years old, she wrote to me. I replied "I wish we could be near so that we can cry together." Thereupon, she called us right away. I remember I was checking my mail outside of my house. When I entered my house, I heard mama talking to her on the phone. But I felt sorry because the phrase "I cannot see you while I cry. Rather, I look ahead to collect myself. Then, I turn to you for consolation." Things like that are not my words. They reflect what I feel. But my own words are sprung from my own well. If I use someone else's more refined phrases, they will be bound to be disappointed. I was sad because when I use my own words, nobody cares. But when I use someone else's kinder, warmer, tender words, then they turn around and pay attention to me.

One of my long acquaintances is a boy who becomes a doctor. His role-model has been his father. He does not have to wander off, to drift away. He just needs to follow in his father's footstep. Like a long tapering tree branch, the further subsequent generations becomes, the weaker brilliance is drained. There is an old saying is that, "Even when a multi-millionaire suffers from bankrupcy, his wealth is handed down up to the successive third generation." When I think of my maternal cousin, however, she is so self-made, and self-willed.

I am reading her word again "One lives days in imaginging one's dream constantly, then, before one is aware, one's dream comes true unawares."

I once had a dream. But I long concluded that my dream is an unworthy cause, a wasteful fantasy. My dream is like a giraffe which has long legs. As I spend my days in daydreaming, the giraffe (my dream incarnate)'s legs are spreading farther and farther until they split myself into discrepancies, incompatible factors. I find myself chasing two strange things at once. I no longe rknow what I want, what I dream feasibly. Why can't my maternal cousin adds "Yes, my dream. For those who are curious, my dream is for instance so-and-so.." Maybe I can email her directly and ask about this quote. "Would you please elaborate on this further in detail? Can you tell me more fully and clearly?"

I once talked about dreams nonstop. My dream is ill-advised, not permissible, misguided, ill-assorted, disorienting. Furthermore, I am not a fitting person to fulfill my dream. My dream has aged so long as to get rotten, anachronistic. My dream is too adolescent to suit my adult identity. She must have had the dream, but before it gets too out of touch with reality, she makes it come true. My deep-seated dream, however, outweighs my existence with disillusion, burdnes, self-doubt, regrets, and disbelief.

I may persist in keeping my dream. As a gardener, I may water my dream like a plant. Watering a plant is an analogy for investing each and every moment here and now to fulfill one's dream. But I am too lonely, too sick, too wasted, too reduced. I can't stoop that low.

If there is at least some common blood between me and her, perhaps the concept that worked for her, may work for me. Like a prosthetic crutch, can I graft her idea upon my thought. My dream is too crazed. Like a gooey miasma, or abysmal swamp, the more I think of my dream, the deeper I feel I am digging my grave hole. According to her "One lives by imaginging one's dream, then, before one realizes, one's dream has come true unawares." What if I am not worthy of my dream, while she was worthier than her dream? I am sure that she and I are equally valuable and precious grandchildren in our late grandmother's eyes. (Grandma! Please deign, condescend to love me as much as her.) But the starting point was the same, but I am retrograding on a backstretch, while she already sprinted on the homestretch, jumps over the last remaining hurdle and crossed the finishing line. I can imagine the vast different of quality and substance between her future and mine.

What is my dream anyway? Is there anybody out there who roots for me?