Dream bloom
Everyone has been a dreamer, and everyone has woven one dream after another. Those are like children’s initial yearning for a better future. Our life is like a flower, it can be blooming more than one time, but not necessarily to have a result each bloom. The first time we were assigned to the same group, Maria DeJesus I saw, is a somewhat quiet girl but always smiling. As my interview progressed, I got to know more about Maria. Maria DeJesus is a supported, caring, listening person. She had lived in Washington Hill since she was born. She has three siblings in her family, two brothers and one sister. She, as the second kid in her family, was given a lot of hope by her parents.
Maria is very into art and very passionate about art when she was little. When she was in high school, she joined the art club and took an active part in the art club every week. Her favorite part about the art club is painting. Before she started telling me the story of her paintings, I asked her this question, what has she secretly dreamed of. Maria smiled as she had at first and told me, “Artist”.
However, you can’t imagine that when she was a child, her parents were against her studying art. When she was 10 years old, she found that she liked drawing and painting. At that time, she asked her parents to buy her some art martial. Her parents rejected it and told her that doing art costs a lot, they cannot afford her to do so. Maria cried for it and didn’t understand why they said no to her. At the fact that she has three siblings, it will cause family jealousy if her parents only buy her art material, but others do not. Also, if she starts drawing or painting, it will make her house messy and hard to clean. That’s the major reason why her parents didn’t want it to happen.
The day after she was rejected, she made a decision, but it was this decision that brought unexpected changes to the family. Fortunately, her parents gave Maria and her siblings tips, but only if they are willing to help with housework. For example, cleaning tables, washing dishes or taking out the garbage. Maria can get a reward for doing what she can. She helped her mother wash vegetables, cleaned the table after dinner and helped her father get some repair tools. Her parents expressed encouragement for her performance. She told me that her parents had praised her more than once at the dinner in front of her siblings. Through her influence on helping around the house, Maria’s brothers and sister began to act in unison. They mowed the lawn together and cleared the cluttered room. Maria exclaimed in surprise and said, “I still can’t believe it we worked together and cleared the whole room!” Her conscientious attitude brings her brothers and sisters to help together. I believe, under her motivation, no one can say no to work with her. Her actions speak for themselves.
By helping her parents repeatedly, she started to accumulate a pocket of money. Finally, she bought her own sketchbooks and color pencils. Even if she had gotten what she wanted, Maria is not the kind of person who suddenly gives up helping her parents. On the contrary, Maria became more active in helping her family, not only her parents but also her brothers and sisters. Not only that, she became less concerned about how much money she could make from help and just focused on helping her family. She right now develops a good habit of helping to work together and enjoying it. At that time, Maria, unlike the shy smile she has, she became a little bit proud of herself within her smile.
Dreams can come true both intentionally and unintentionally. I asked Maria whether she still wants to be an artist, she told me the artist dream now was far beyond the range of possibility. From the first time she owned her sketchbooks till now, she’s never given up on this drawing and painting habits. No matter if she is in a good moon or a bad moon, she, as usual, opens her sketchbooks and draws it down what she had seen in her day. Maybe right now her dream is no longer to be an artist, but Maria inadvertently opened the hearts of siblings to actively help their family. She made the unintentional dream of strengthening her family closeness come true. Her new dream is still on the way. This may sound like a distant dream, but it is not so far away. Just like what Maria said, “With the new day comes new strength and new thoughts.” Through new things, we can discover new ourselves and thus pursue our new dreams. Never afraid to fail, our dream is blooming.
