The Importance of Dreams

Source: londonbakes.com via Pinterest

I don't know about you but I love to dream. I would say it is one of my absolute favourite past times, next to baking and eating cookies or cuddling with my cat. Oh, and watching clouds race by on a blue summer sky and finally, finally waking one morning and being able to bury my nose deeply in my favourite rose. If you have never had the pleasure, I do highly recommend finding a The Pilgrim rose by the end of July when the flower the most. You will be in seventh heaven, as the fragrance wrap around you, a delicate creamy apple and lemon with hints of vanilla porridge. It is all the scents that are good, and summery, and girlish, and delightful all wrapped in the creamy, yellow heart of The Pilgrim rose. It doesn't hurt that it is a very romantic, fluffy, classic so called English rose either. But that is just icing on top of the cake, really. Because it could have been the simplest pink hedge rose, and I would still wait eagerly for that morning when finally it starts to blossom. As does the bumble bees.

In any case, a dreamer. I'm already dreaming my way to summer, when my vegetable garden will scream at me to get rid of the weeds that of some reason always grow better than my vegetables - why is that?! - and the wasps will be flying after me in formation, trying to steal my chicken from me. They do that, my wasps. If I let them, they will cut it up in small pieces and fly away with them. It is fascinating, and annoying, all at the same time dealing with wasps in the garden.

At times I do spend too much time in rose coloured dreams, I think. Some people in my life claim I'd do better to focus on the here and now instead. But I will argue that they are wrong, because I think dreaming is amongst the most important things we as humans can do. Perhaps it doesn't make the top ten list, but it definitely makes the top 100. The reason?

The reason is very simple: dreams is nourishment for the soul and the foundation of the future. Without people who dream where would we be? There would most definitely not be any Doctor Who (so looking forward to the next season!) being shown on television. In fact, I don't think there would be any television period. Because without dreams, no one would have envisioned a machine like the telly, would they? Nor any manuscripts to be turned into shows.

Humans stumble over discoveries all the time, true. So society would not be all doomed without dreams.There might still be fire and perhaps a round wheel. But discoveries need dreams to turn into true inventions. Dreams are important in that very real way. But dreams being the foundation of society as we know it it is not why dreams are important to me, personally. Not really.

For me the importance of dreams is this: they allow me to escape the here and now for something else for a little while. When you live in a country where it seems it is snowing eight months out of twelve, and half the year is dark and dreary, daydreaming is an essential gift to have. It is almost the first of April. It is snowing steadily outside even though the birds are chirping their defiance on our roof. Dreams about a roaring fire, newly baked cinnamon rolls and sinfully rich, dark chocolate is what carries me through days like this. A dream that is easy enough to turn into delicious, and soul nourishing reality with this delicious salted caramel vodka hot chocolate from londonbakes.com and the fantastic cinnamon roll recipe from thepioneerwoman.com. Now, both recipes can be tweaked easily enough according to your tastes and ingredients at hand. I made the cinnamon rolls with apple slices rolled into them, no glacing, and they turned out fantastic. The thing about the pioneerwoman's recipe that makes them so delicious is how she bakes them. Packing them tight, with plenty of butter in the bottom, allows the dough to soak up the butter and preserves the moisture in the rolls. Which makes for much juicer cinnamon rolls, that are particularly well suited to being frozen and then thawed again. Tasting almost like newly baked, if you heat them gently in the oven for a few minutes or microwave them. Personally, I prefer the oven method of heating, only because my microwave has a tendency to make concrete blocks out of everything put into it.

Of course, not all dreams are as easy to turn into reality as this. No matter how much I dream it, the snow never seems to melt. Oh well...

Until next time,

Camilla