I lay down, the browning, dry summer grass cracking underneath my weight. I stare at the night sky; full of splendor. The stars are like tiny lanterns that glow for one sole purpose; to ignite the sky. I think about how much I would hate to be the stars, always coming second to the stifling beauty that is the sky.

When I was younger I was obsessed with trying to do the impossible, count the stars. My naive little brain honestly thought that it was possible. I felt like all the stars deserved to be counted, deserved to be documented, now I know that the stars are nothing more than burnt up balls of gas, and that we as human beings do not owe them anything. The stars do not deserve to be counted. In truth no one, and nothing, neither human nor star deserves anything at all. The universe doesn’t care about insignificant singular beings; it’s not conspiring against us, or working night and day to give us what we feel we are entitled to. The universe is the ultimate neutral party. I know this to be true because no one in the history of the world has truly gotten what they deserved. If they did, Hitler would have been dead before World War two even began and no innocent child would ever be diagnosed with cancer.

I sit up, feeling the warm night breeze dance across my bear arms. It has that wonderfully heavy feeling that only June nights in North Carolina can bring. Like a sheet, fresh out of the dryer being wrapped around your cold shoulders and reminding you that there is some good left in the world.

I reach for the battered black leather notebook that sits inches away from me along with a flashlight. After all I came out here for a reason; to make a list.

I write the word “dead” at the top of the first page. This is a list of dead dreams, some long forgotten, others still fresh, dreams that never came true and yet I still manage to be nostalgic for them, I miss having hope, having dreams. I miss the idea of a future that’s better than the present. Although every present moment was once the future, and so far nothing is how I thought it would be. Just thinking about dreams like these feels like salt in an open wound.

I push my thoughts to the back of my mind wishing I could forget them entirely, but I can’t. So instead I write.

The world seems to freeze around me as I furiously scribble every forgotten dream. When I was six I wanted to be a singer, being an artist at the age of eight follows that. The dreams of living in a big mansion, moving to England, and becoming a poet, all dead and virtually forgotten until now, as they spill from my pen, onto the paper. Showing me how little I've accomplished. Dream after dream, year after year. Some are so small and insignificant; I can barely remember why I dreamt them in the first place. Others put a hint of a smile on my face. Remembering a different me, a younger, more optimistic Tabitha Miers, a version of myself that died when the dreams did makes me happy, because as much as it can hurt, there is always a little happiness found in the art of remembering.

As I write, I am freeing myself, word by word, of all the dead dreams I’ve carried around like heavy luggage. I list these dreams for hours, fatigue and hand cramps try to make me stop, but like the tears that start to sting my eyes, I barely feel them; I refuse to let myself feel.

I continue to write until the sun starts to peak up over the inverted roof of my big yellow house. I worry about the curious eyes watching me from the passing cars, but still I write my list of dead dreams, I don’t really care what these people, the ones that drive by watching me intently, think anyway because they are all lifeless, caught up in the mania of pointless routines such as work or school, which give them a sense of purpose, until they can actually have one. When in reality there is a very good chance that they will never have one. They spend their entire life waiting around for something that will never happen. But I’m sitting here listing all my dead dreams, so who am I to talk. This is no different than the desk jobs that people try, day after day, to convince themselves are fulfilling.

I write, and write, and I refuse to stop, because I am pathetically desperate for the weight to be lifted off of my shoulders. I finish just as the sun raises high enough to be completely seen, no longer blocked by the shingles on the roof of my house that for some ineffable reason doesn’t feel much like a home anymore.

Forty-seven dead dreams in seventeen years. I thought that when I finally finished I’d feel better, lighter, and happier even, it’s why I started in the first place. Only now do I realize that my efforts were for nothing because I feel nothing more than reminded. Reminded that I will never be anything, reminded that I am stuck and that every dream I ever dream will end up dead and forgotten. I am reminded that a hundred years from now when I’m dead and gone, and everyone I know and love is gone too, my entire existence will be nothing more than a combination of letters written on an old census somewhere, and that nobody will care about me and everything I’ve done will be forgotten, all the pain I’ve endured will have been for nothing; useless.

I am not the sky; vast and brilliant, and appreciated by many. I am not even the stars; working to make the sky more beautiful. I am a nameless piece of space rock that nobody will ever care about, just floating through space waiting to be forgotten. I always wanted to fly, to soar above and beyond, not float, and defiantly not to be anything more than disregarded and worthless, but that’s what I am. It’s what we all are really. The tears flow freely now, it’s been too long since they have.