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The American Dream by F. A. Goodwin
Monday, June 25, 2007
Rated "PG" by the Author.
This speach was written for an English public speaking class, to which I received a standing ovation afterwards.
Every night I lay down and fall off to sleep where uncontrollable dreams criss-cross throughout my resting mind. Religiously at 6:30 a.m. the buzz of my alarm clock sounds and as I open my eyes, instantly my private images are thoughtlessly wiped away from my remembrance, escaping my desires to even recall them.
In 36 years I have experienced thousands of dreams. Yet, my favorite dream takes place while I am awake. It is best described using the 5 senses, it sounds like the conversations I have with daughter while driving her to school, it feels like the tears that slid from my eyes when I saw the proofs of my son pictured in his cap and gown, it taste like my favorite seafood meal, it smells like sweet success, and it looks like you, it looks like me, it looks like us.
This dream …My favorite dream…Is the American dream…
Throughout its history millions of people have flocked to America in search of this dream and yet millions of Americans dare to seek it out. We seem to take it for granted. We wait for it to come to us. Or we look it in the eye and rebuke it.
As I stand before you today and as I look out at the diversity of your faces I am reminded of my youth. 18 years ago I was a freshman at Penn State University with a great future in engineering ahead of me, except I dropped out to chase something other than my dream. Many people counted me out when I allowed life to step in front of my dreams¾ and their expectations of me.
That’s what makes the American Dream so unique and it is available to everyone yet it belongs to you. It allows you to switch directions as many times as you desire and you are allowed to fall down and get back up¾ again and again.
My first official encounter with the Dream came after spending a countless number of years working for others, then one day I finally realized I had what it takes to start my own business, and I did just that. It took three more years to realize it wasn’t to late to follow my dreams and go after the college degree that I’d longed for.
The tenets of the American Dream are not only limited to financial success. I can feel its essence every day that I wake up to my children, every day some one tells me they read my book and they loved it, and I revel in the thoughts of my future each day that I get closer to earning my degree. And something as simple as typing my name into Googles search engine and witnessing my name appear alongside a book that I wrote, makes my heart flutter..
Much can be said about America but I say forget its politics, set aside the violence, and pray for the less fortunate. There is no greater place on earth I’d rather be.
This seldom spoke of dream took Hilary Swank from a trailer park to the stage of the Oscars - twice. It has taken has taken young men from the hoods of New York to the boardrooms of Park Ave. And it has soared a little black girl from Mississippi to a pinnacle of unimaginable heights and on to become a one name icon - Oprah.
In a few days we will all bare witness to one of the greatest examples of the American Dream when our very own Philadelphia native, Will Smith, portrays, Chris Gardner, a once homeless man who slept in the bathroom of a San Francisco train station with his son as he slowly and steadily climbed the corporate ladder and become a self made multi-millionaire . The movie is aptly titled, The Pursuit of Happyness.
Humbly I say I’m just a nobody trying to tell everybody that the American dream is by far no myth, it is real, and it affably awaits anyone who seeks it out. Today and every day I celebrate the Fantastic American Dream!
Thank You!
