I had a very interesting dream last night. I dreamed that I was in a traveling company of some musical and we had been going from city to city performing. Along the way, in one of the fabulous hotels we were staying at, I happened to meet the actor Ryan Gosling (you know, that guy from The Notebook) and he put a large iguana on my head. He told me it was his special pet and he needed me to take care of it, and then he left. I stood there for a little while, but then I decided that I was very tired of keeping this iguana on my head, so I tried to find him to give it back. He was nowhere to be seen. I looked and looked and looked all around for him, while the iguana licked my ear and dug its raptor talons deeper and deeper into my scalp. Finally, I ran into him hitting on another cast member from the company in a dark hallway somewhere.

“Take this stupid lizard back!!” I yelled. “This thing is gross and I don’t want to hold it any more! I never agreed to this!”

He slipped me a handsome Hollywood half-smile and said, “No- I’m busy. You keep it a little longer. It’s not hurting you.”

I was fully enraged. “That’s it! My husband is going to settle this! He’s a lot bigger than you, ya know.” And like a perfectly-timed movie script, in walked Chris, looking none too happy about the iguana on my head. He didn’t say a word to Ryan Gosling. All he did was pluck the lizard off of me and stick back into Rayn’s Hollywood face. I have no idea how tall RG is in real life, but in my dream, he looked a full foot shorter than Chris.

The Hollywood half-smile had transformed into a face of confusion and terror. Ryan took his iguana back, consoled it for having to endure such hardship and Chris and I left the scene, feeling like champs. Suck it, Ryan Gosling! I woke up a little later feeling like I had just had a very fun adventure. I looked over at my knight-in-shining-armor husband, who by that time had stolen all of the covers and was drooling out of the corner of his almost-snoring mouth. I wanted to give him a high-five.

So and so what on earth does this have to do with anything at all? Probably nothing. But it did make me think about life a bit. Everybody has iguanas on their heads.  Life is complicated and stressful and is never as fun or as perfect as you imagined it to be, and the talons of disappointment dig into our scalps much deeper than we’d like. Most of us are not as good-looking as Ryan Gosling, nor will we be a rich and fabulous as he is. It takes a real-life knight to sweep in and snatch that iguana right off of our heads and make us realize how wonderful life really is, no matter how messed up it seems. Chris is my iguana snatcher. When I feel stressed or sad or overwhelmed or disappointed, he reminds me that things are not as bad as they seem. It’s all in (or on) my head. It makes me want to go give him a high-five.

This post may be a little more sentimental than my usual stuff. I guess it’s kinda necessary every once in a while. My hope is that you have an iguana snatching knight in your life as well. It might be a good idea to high-five them for all of their hard work.