I've always had strange dreams. Literally, in terms of the dreams playing in my brain at night, as well as the other kind- goals for your life. When I was a kid, I remember being in a field chucking hay onto a wagon, looking at this amazing sunset. I wished that I could take a picture of it and play with those colors, somehow get them into a computer, and change the colors around. I then realized that I'd been born too early- there was no way this was going to happen.

Then I wandered into a demonstration at college, some years later, for version 1.0 of a new program called "Adobe Photoshop". That was one dream come true. I've been playing with it ever since, even back when it would crash if you moved the mouse while it ran a filter.

When I was in High School, I wanted to start a company to mine the asteroids. I figured it wouldn't take much platinum or gold to break even. And in the asteroid belt, if you have time, food, and air, you could find it. Then the Challenger exploded and I recognized that I had in fact been born too early. Now I think maybe not. It might take a billion dollars I don't have, but someone will do it.

For a while my dream involved music. Bringing a lot of people together to reach some sort of critical mass, where some people would go away inspired in some way that actually mattered. I think that one actually happened, but now I realize that in high energy environments, not only do some particles shoot up out into the sky, some get plowed into the ground with just as much force. I can dimly see some sort of future of mind-to-mind interface crossed with visual, sonic, and virtual art that leads to a new kind of consciousness- really a new life form- in which people are more like cells in a larger mind. But that will probably be illegal, persecuted, and technically impossible for another couple of decades.

One that remained the whole duration of my life has been the dream of remaining free. Not free in the sense of no responsibilities- but in the sense of choosing them. Not that I don't want to give my life to something, but that I want to choose something worthy of giving it to. I walk into this strange economic organism every day, and watch it grow and get better at what it does- and it feels good. We screw up less than we used to. We accomplish more with less stress on all of us. Everyone is learning to do not just work- but creative art. Most of our customers have no idea just how amazing the crew's art is. Damon's going to do a show in March at the Green House Arts Project... I suggest you check it out, he's a hell of a painter.

I don't know why I put all this up here... there's so much else I need to do- update the lame websites, organize the new office, finish the files for the year end. I just have to remind myself that any time it feels like a nightmare, that it's actually the opposite.