The Thing About A Dream

First things first: wow I haven't been on here in a while, huh? Sorry about that, if anyone has taken to reading my blog. I've been busy and uninspired lately, without anything interesting to say. In comparison to other stuff, I think this post is going to be relatively mediocre.
The thing I want to talk about - seeing as I've been taking a trip down memory lane by switching on my old laptop which I used to use years ago - is having a dream. You know what I'm talking about: like wanting to become a rocket scientist or something.
When I was little I think my first dream was to be a singer and I think that still lingers somewhere at the back of my mind but I've always been way too shy to pursue it and realistically I'm not that good at it. But then I wanted to become an artist. I remember every kid saying they wanted to be an artist about three years afterwards. I don't know if they all genuinely did or whether it was because they caught my dream and decided it would be fun to follow (bearing in mind I was about eight when this happened). I decided because everyone else wanted to do that I would become a marine biologist, though I never really understood what that meant except I would be looking at beautiful creatures all the time and hanging out with dolphins. I was very fond of animals when I was small.
But this dream quickly faded simply because I was never really confident at science. I'd always been really fond of drawing, and often this led to writing, or perhaps the other way round. I still have notepads from when I must have been seven, with a really short and crappy story in it. Something along the lines of: "Sandra went to the shop. She bought a bag of potatoes. She went home and ate and was very happy. The end."
So I decided I wanted to be an artist with words, so I worked hard to aspire to become an author one day. I remember telling people when I first discovered what I wanted to be, and they always asked what an author was, so I had to explain it was a writer.
I don't know what happened but after I first discovered my dream I never really told anyone about it because I was both shy and quite ashamed at what people would think. I always spent my free time writing some story and trying to improve. I never aspired to be J.K.Rowling, in fact I think one of my earliest influences was Meg Cabot. Then a bit later it was Stephenie Meyer (a word here: people always slate her for Twilight, and I myself have grown out of the series, but I have also read The Host and that has one of my favourite romance quotes in it. Also, it takes a lot of talent. Saying she can't write is wrong. Otherwise, how the hell is she so successful? I agree I don't like the character of Bella, but I really love the Jacob stuff because it shows diversity). But between those two periods, I had a favourite writer called Sharon Creech. My grandparents bought me a selection of her books, and they were all really touching. Chasing Redbird and Walk Two Moons are two of my favourites.
Anyway, the main point of this is that I never told anyone for a few years. I thought people would find it weird. But I think it was the worst when I tried to hide it, because it wasn't as if I was hiding anything bad, it was just precious to me and I didn't want to be ridiculed for it or for someone to take that away from me be latching onto my dream.
I'm open about it now. Well, as open as I can be. I'm very shy after all. I think it really helped when one of my male friends took an interest. He was the one I first shared my sci-fi attempt with and he's always been enthusiastic since. I really appreciate it. A friend of mine at the time also used to watch me write on my old laptop at some points but I was always really shy about that because I was quite paranoid. And now I excitably force my writing onto my best friend.
I don't know why I felt like sharing this, but yeah. All my friends were accepting. And some of them embraced it and wanted to help. So, that leads nicely onto a moral. I think.
So the thing about dreams: never be afraid to share them.
PS: Sorry for any mistakes. It is close to midnight here.