[eclecticmuses] October 2008 - A dream

October 2008 - Have you ever had a dream that felt so real that you had trouble realizing it was a dream? What was it about?

Although it wasn't technically a dream, I suppose a fantasy should essentially count, especially when it was so very encompassing and pleasing, and was shared by so many others. But it was most definitely not real.

( Imagine all the people, living life in peace... )

[quotable_muse] 87 - "A pity... I never had any children."

87 - "I thought I heard you saying it was a pity... pity I never had any children."
- 'Goodbye, Mr. Chips'

A few years before I left for Sunnydale, I learned that even amongst Watchers and others in the business of investigating the supernatural, my circle of acquaintances was not immune to a very common phenomenon. Nearly anyone with more than a handful of people with whom they associate and are all within a small age range of one another will, or has, experienced the sudden onset of domesticity.

All of a sudden, there are weddings to attend every few months, housewarming parties and baby announcements. Adults in their late twenties, accustomed to purchasing gift cards and novelty items for their friends' gifts will suddenly be poring over registries and making sure that they don't buy the wrong model of pram.

They were the new generation of Watchers, the men and women with whom I'd attended Academy and had graduated with, just before or just after me. I won't pretend that we were the kind of close-knit, "meet you down at the pub after work" every Friday night sort of friends, but they were the people with whom I'd become familiar. Now, they were changing into husbands and wives and parents.

There are, clearly, many Watchers quite capable of making families work within the unusual circumstances of their callings. Without that ability, there wouldn't be Watcher families like mine. But it just never appealed to me. I did very little dating or socialising at the time, both by choice and by circumstance, but I was focused and determined to make the most of my career, to be the exemplary Watcher I had always been told by my instructors that I could be.

Knowing more about the world, I won't say as I regret not having settled down then. This job can become deathly dangerous for both myself and anyone who cares for me. But one can't help but wonder, especially as those old acquaintances are now sending out graduation notices and invitations to coming-out parties.

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