“Okay so this is our pirate ship and we’re being chased by the bad pirates okay?” Seth said when we had climbed into the tree fort.
“But it isn’t real though,” I said, slightly concerned about the prospect of being chased by bad pirates.
“Well yeah it is,” he said. “ ‘Cause we’re playing it.”
I thought about his strange idea as I gripped the plastic, yellow, steering wheel nailed into the wood of the fort. I knew my clever older brother didn’t think it was actually real; he meant that somehow our pretending was real. It was my first encounter with the idea that imagination could make something real, that dreams could be almost as sweet as reality.
Now I’m not talking about any Cartesian understanding of reality existing only in the mind—“I think therefore I am” sort of stuff. I’m referring to the power of imagination to create—be it the play of two kids in their backyard, the draft of a novel, or the plans for a future.
Over fifteen years after my brother and I sailed the seven seas in our swing set, I don’t actually remember how our escapade with the pirates concluded, but I do remember my brother’s wise insight, even if he doesn’t. It has stayed with me all these years, through games we played to stories I wrote, ideas that took shape in words that became real. I think that that childish understanding of the world is the key to success…the belief that dreams can become reality.
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