No age is too old to follow your dreams.  I know of a few 80 yr olds who’ve gone back to college. My grandfathers dream was to travel the world, and he’s doing that now, at 83.  Age is only a limit if you make it a limit. 

My dream was to own a business and to be financially independent. I’m only 30, but I’m well on my way. It took a massive leap of faith to start the ball rolling, but I’m glad I did. While the latter half of my dream hasn’t been realized yet, the former is a roaring success. :)

 My husband’s dreams pretty much coincide w/ my own, so that helps. It was also a major factor in my decision to marry him. Our daughter is five, and already an independent thinker. (Another dream of both my husband and I.)  I can’t wait to see how she turns out as an adult. We’re teaching her not to let anything hold her back. 

 If there is one thing I’ve learned, in my short time living, it’s never let anyone or anything hold you back from accomplishing your dreams. This includes yourself.  There are so many things out there to be done and to be seen. It’s a shame so many people don’t recognize that. 

Ms.Bergen, I’ve enjoyed your work since I was a young child. I grew up with Murphy and I held that character as a role model. She meant so much to me.  Thank you. 

My Dreams:

That somehow, someway my severely disabled daughter would be able to "grow back" her brain cells that were destroyed at birth by a massive hemmorage. Maybe they could be "regenerated" via a new (stem cell?) medical program?

And that the same stem cell reseach will discover how to clone organs. 

Then I wouldn’t need a transplanted kidney anymore (or the horrible medications and side effects that go along with them!) or hemodialysis to stay alive - they could just grow me a new one!

Both of these things would make me very happy.  For now though, they are only dreams.

I am grateful for every step of my path…even the hard ones, they taught me more…and made me much more aware of my world around me.

In my hardships, I’ve learned how to create boundaries so I don’t step in the same cycles my childhood created.

….and that is part of my journey. That also doesn’t mean it’s my future.

Everyone deserves happiness. Especially if you’ve worked for it.

I have a painting created for The People of my Nation…that I would like to make do some good. Art is a fundraising tool, not a drain on society, and society need to remember that truth…Art is healing, Art is history, and Art inspires. 

What’s being stolen…Art, why…because when it’s relevant, it doesn’t depreciate…

When I came to Atlanta I came here to make sense of the death of my husband. And in that process I reconnected with the earth…to understand. He was not a good man, and we had a child….so, I wanted a fair shot to teach my son what hard work and determination build in a person by living truth.

Because I was not in any space to commit to another marriage … the first was violent and horrifically abusive and I knew I didn’t want a repeat of what I had already experienced. I was also a widow, with a son. I chose to date someone who I never lived with for 6 years of my son’s life. He hurt my son, and when I witnessed it. I ended it.

Again, I was denied justice by another state only this time it’s the one I call home. Because I made a home with good history for my son here, and I know I did.

I had nothing but what I knew. So I worked doing murals and custom finishes for my clients who were knowingly not paying me what I needed to fully support my family. And I kept working because I had to support my family. …and in doing so gained the historical relevance my work needed. Ray was my cheerleader. I would tell him some things, but mostly I would work to inspire happiness by telling him the happiness I had found in my work, and my son…and he valued that…and so did Edie…

 I made mistakes in the beginning … I had no family I could believe in, and I had just been widowed. And I kept talking to Paul, and Susi, and Ray and Edie, and Sharon…they became my family. In Chicago, not Iowa.

Away from Georgia, Chicago is home to me. I’m grateful for the lessons I learned both here and there, because those lessons taught me to stand up for what I believe in, and to fight for what’s right.

Iowa will always have a place in my heart, because it is where I am from. It’s also a place where when I told a judge I had been raped for the second time by my then legally separated from husband while waiting for a divorce from that same abusive first husband…I was told in an open courtroom that effectively I didn’t count as a human being.

Because there is a law on the books in Iowa that requires a woman who is married until the date of actual divorce to provide her husband with sex and he has the right by law to get it anyway he can, which includes rape. This is a state in Our Union…People.

Like I said … I am grateful for every step of my path. …and the third time is the charm…my husband Rusty is the light in my world…along with our children.

I am glad to know happiness, because it’s a good place to live in one’s heart by knowing love and truth of a family who believes in you and your work, and you believe in them. I am grateful for knowing that as my truth today.

To read about my art and my life and the challenges I’m currently working to overcome…Please visit simpletownUSA.com

I see my dreams that are worth working for as goals to attain and I work to create productivity, and find peace, and enjoyment in everyday… Because in breath there is life. In life there is creation. Living a life in Art is the only reality Rusty and I know, by following the Paths that we knew were truth for our hearts to follow and to me those are the keys to fulfillment in my eyes. 

Thank you,

Amy, PennDragon Studios

My dream has always been to be a published writer.  I’ve had many documents, training manuals, and military publications published but they don’t count.  The only ones who will read them are in the Gov’t or Military.

I’ve had two poems published, but I’d love to have my book published, I’m just praying to God it happens.

My only other dream was to be a Mom and I have two beautiful children who have made me proud over and over again, to that end, now I dream of being a Grandmom someday soon.

I never thought I’d have an opportunity to share this with you Candice, but this seems to be the appropriate time and place as it applies to my life-long dream/goal.  A long time ago, I was sure that I read about you being a fan of stereo photography.  Now that I search your online bios, etc., I can’t find any mention of it.  Was I mistaken?

For forty years, I’ve been an avid stereographer (like you, or so I thought).  Through the years, I’ve wrung my hands raw trying to think of a way to convert my avocation into a way to make a living.

Now I’m older than my years because of illness, but I’m trying (as hard as I can) to adapt to newer technologies in order to ride the current wave of 3-D enthusiasm/popularity.  I’m establishing a small business ("Maine-ly 3-D") with plans to produce stereo and anaglyph post card booklets of Maine sites (with viewers attached).  Also, I’m producing a Pulfrich DVD of the most recent of our town’s annual Moxie Festival Parade.  I hope to put it in some of the shops on Main Street and sell a few copies.  If there’s enough interest, I’ll be able to make more of them to sell at next summer’s festival; then I’ll create one of the 2010 parade that’s even better.

It’s a very small start, but I think it’s a realistic approach to making my life-long dream/goal come true.  Someday, I might even be able to publish the coffee table book of stereo photos that has always been my ultimate goal.

Sometimes, when I pick up my favorite stereo camera, the thought goes through my head, "I wonder if Candice Bergen ever still uses her stereo camera."  Did I imagine this about you?  If so, I wonder where I would have gotten such an idea!