Beware of Dreams.

I think maybe I have been spending far too much time looking at impressionist art in the last few days and weeks. Maybe it is because I still have a yearning dream to one be a real artist. There is nothing wrong with having a dream it is wrong to have dream and do nothing about making it come true.

 There are some people who do in fact turn their dreams into reality but one particular person makes me want to scream beware what you dream of.

Larry was a lorry driver, but his lifelong dream was to fly. When he left school, he joined the Royal Air Force in hopes of becoming a pilot. Unfortunately, poor eyesight disqualified him. 

So, when he finally left the service, he had to satisfy himself with watching others fly the fighter jets that criss-crossed the skies over his backyard. As he sat there in his garden in his lounger, he dreamed about the magic of flying. 

Then one day, Larry Walters got an idea. He went down to the local Army-Navy surplus store and bought a tank of helium and forty-five weather balloons. These were not your brightly coloured party balloons, these were heave-duty spheres measuring more than four feet across when fully inflated. Back in his yard, Larry used straps to attach the balloons to his lounger. the kind I often see on campsites.

He anchored the chair to the bumper of his four by four and inflated the balloons with helium. Then he packed some sandwiches and drinks and loaded an air-gun, figuring he could pop a few of those balloons when it was time to return to earth. 

His preparations complete, Larry Walters sat in his chair and cut the anchoring cord. His plan was to lazily float up some way, and then slowly come back down to terra firma. 

But, things didn't quite work out that way. 

When Larry cut the cord, he didn't float lazily up - he shot up as if fired from a cannon! Nor did he go up a couple hundred feet. He climbed and climbed, until he finally reached eleven thousand feet! 

At that height, he could hardly risk deflating any of the balloons, lest he unbalance the load and really experience flying! So, he stayed up there, sailing around for fourteen hours, totally at a loss as to how to get down. 

Eventually, he drifted into the approach corridor for  the Airport. 

A pilot of a jumbo aircraft radioed the tower about passing a man in a lounger at eleven thousand feet... with a gun in his lap. (Now there's a conversation I would have liked to have heard!) 

He was now floating above the ocean, and you may know that at nightfall, the winds on the coast begin to change. So, as dusk fell, Larry began drifting out to sea. 

At that point, the coastguard dispatched a helicopter to rescue him. But, the rescue team had a hard time getting to him, because the draft from their propeller kept pushing his home-made contraption farther and farther away. 

Eventually they were able to hover over him and drop a rescue line with which they gradually hauled him back to earth. 

As soon as Larry hit the ground, he was arrested. 

As he was being led away in handcuffs, a television reporter called out to ask, "Mr. Walters, why did you do it?" 

Larry stopped, eyed the man for a moment and replied nonchalantly, "A man can't just sit around."

Beware of what you dream of.

Have a marvellous day. Moving day for me again this time heading to Venise Verte the little green Venice of France a lovely artistic spot.