I read my friend Chantal's blog today as she recounted her birthdays over the years. She mentioned me in one and said this:

"My friend Shaun took me to the mountains for dinner a little later (crutches and all). He made a birthday wish for me that my life-long dream of traveling abroad would come true. Somehow I knew that his wish would come true. He just seemed to me to be one of those people who always got what he wished for."

Sure enough, her next birthday was spent in France where she spent the year studying. She later served an LDS mission in France, and has traveled to Mexico (a spontaneous trip with me), Thailand, and I don't know where else. I'd like to take credit for this wish come true, but other than the Mexico trip, it was simply inevitable. She's one of the most motivated, goal-oriented people I've ever known, with pages and pages of what you might call a "to do list," except in place of "wash the car, call Mom," her list was filled with things like "learn pottery, learn Spanish, buy a house, go to law school." If anything, the only magic she needed was for someone to believe in her dreams. Of course it's always nice to be remembered, and her last sentence is bouncing around in my head now, and I realize two things: 1. It's true. My wishes always seem to come true. Not always when I first make them, not always as fast as I want them to, but eventually, it seems most of the things I wish for end up happening. Like how I always dreamt of some miracle where I would no longer need glasses or contacts. Years later, along comes lasik surgery. I've been glasses-free for years and loving it. Dreams come true even after I've forgotten the wish. Like when I decided to climb the Grand Teton. I forgot about it, but a few years later, my first time on top of Timpanogos, I met the brother of one of the girls I was with. "Shaun climbs," she told him, and a week or two later I was invited to join his expedition up the Grand. Chris and I and his whole family have been close friends ever since. 2. It's nice to think positive things about yourself. It's nice to walk around with the perception that wishes come true, good things happen, and you never know when everything can change and I wind up getting exactly what I wanted all along. Some things seem long overdue, but once they happen, then the waiting is over, and it doesn't really matter anymore. It seems that lately this process has been speeding up. Little miracles seem to be happening in every direction. Little clues seem to indicate that all my fondest dreams could come true any minute now. So far they're all in the very early stages and there are no chickens to count, only eggs. I'll sit on them, keep them warm, and wait for them to hatch.