Dreamers

At my last class with the oldest group I had a thoughtful conversation (in English!) with Jakuta, the girl I mentioned in my post with some student profiles who speaks English really well. None of my students who are older than thirteen go to school and many younger ones don't either because prejudice and de facto segregation are prevalent in most schools through the Balkans. When I asked Jakuta about returning to school or finding work using her language abilities she called me crazy and said I dream like an American. I dream like an American? How can dreams vary with nationality? I thought they were universal shades of hope and possibility threaded on the same needle. I thought the only types of dreams were ones that push our realities and mind to think bigger and that even though dreams vary in attainability based on circumstance I thought that the potential to dream exists in all of us. When did society become a dichotomy of dreamers and infidels? When did the spool of imagination tangle and the thread of belief unwind? How old must you be to have been convinced by society that you are not a dreamer, that you do not deserve to dream, that dreams are for others, not for you, that dreaming is a waste. I take pride in being a dreamer but I don't know if I'm good at living in a world where dreaming discriminates.