To Sleep: Perchance to Dream

 28 years ago I sat in a small courtroom a couple of rows in front of a former student. Apparently his lifelong marriage contract was ending on the same day that mine was. That was a very strange feeling.

Life hasn't been rainbows and unicorns, nor did I expect it to be. But it has been real. It has been on my terms. There were no longer people going through my things.  Or cluck-clucking over my children. All the knives were gone from my back.

"To sleep: Perchance to dream...." There was nothing, and I mean nothing, as wonderful as laying my head down on that puffy pillow & closing my eyes that night, knowing that my life finally belonged to me.

I'm sure that's what Shakespeare was referencing.