So, I meant to write about this yesterday but I kind of got caught up cleaning up and uploading the pictures that are currently in my gallery. There are so many more on the way, but at least I have most of it done! My $50 job! I'm so proud of it! And I'm really proud of these boys! They're so wonderful! ^^ But, anyway... I have a tendency to fall in and out of sleep. The other day I woke up and still felt tired so I decided to go back to bed. I slept for an extra 15 - 20 minutes and had the strangest dream that, for some reason, made me incredibley happy.

I dreamt that I was on a train - but not just any train. It was a train that hovered over land and water and, therefore, required no tracks and the train itself was created of earth and grass on the outside with the way to the inside being like the outside of a beautiful, cozy, Victorian-style cottage. The inside, though, looked exactly like the trains in Europe but with more room in the compartments and better bathrooms since it seemed to be a train for long travels as well. In any case, I remember being out on the back because I was getting off at a station, but I forgot something inside the train. So I go running back into the train and grab what I need and find my brother and his girlfriend settling into their compartment. I asked them where they were heading and they answered "Berlin" which is my favorite city in all of Europe. I smiled and told them to have fun as I exited the compartment only to find a brochure for touring Berlin right below my feet. It seemed as though it had been dropped by a passenger, so I decided to leave it alone and continued on to the back door where I would be at the platform to deboard. Unfortunately, the train had already started to leave the station by the time I go to the back door which was, essentially, a ledge of earth.

For some reason one of my German professors, Sabine, who is now back in Berlin teaching at the Freie Universität was on the ledge too. I asked her, "Do you think I can make it? I don't know if it's going too fast for me to jump off!" She smiled at me and told me to take a deep breath and just try as best as I could. And I took a deep breath but couldn't leave the platform. I turned around to look at her and she told me, "Everything is going to be okay. Just jump!" in German which, somehow, calmed me enough to convince me to step back enough to take a running start and jump with my eyes closed off of the platform and onto the earth over which the train was hovering. I didn't hurt myself since the platform wasn't too far up from the earth below and the train wasn't going as fast as I had thought - though fast enough to get us rather far from the last station - and was pleasantly surprised when I landed softly and without injury. I took my traveler's backpack off my back and set it down next to me while I smiled happily at the fact that I had landed so safely. Then I heard Sabine yell after me once again in German: "Turn around and look around you!" And so I did.

I turned around and my breath was taken away at the sight before my eyes which caused me to break out into a huge smile and feel like crying for some reason. The sky was an absolutely gorgeous, crystal/baby blue decorated with only a few stretched and somewhat transluscent clouds somewhat resembling stretched cotton balls. I was standing in a field of soft, golden wheat which glimmered gently when the strong yet gentle and warm wind would blow and send my hair flying about in the same direction as the wheat field. Sabine's voice said, "Look over there!" to me in German, and so I looked straight ahead only to see crisp blue ocean water not too far from where I was standing, but definitely not right at my feet. There were a few people swimming around with snorkel and scuba gear along with some huge sharks. But, when I say huge, I don't mean Great White-huge, I mean H.U.G.E. but tender looking. Intimidating but yet somehow absolutely peaceful, beautiful, and tender. I was staring at the swimming creatures in this beautiful body of water - watching the sun shimmering softly off the tiny waves created at the shore and the surface of the water - when I suddenly heard an extremely loud rumbling noise like that of an airplane. I looked up only to see another incredibley large creature headed my way. What was incredibley interesting about this particular creature is that it seemed to be a hybrid of a grey, bottle-nosed dolphin and a stingray to allow it to fly and glide through the air swiftly and gracefully. I ducked to try and avoid it hitting my head even though it didn't even come close to me. It's shadow overwhelmed the golden wheat field and disappeared in a flash as it flew away. When it went away I could see my face and I was so happy that I was crying.

And then I woke up feeling extremely happy. And that was my amazing dream.