As you lay in your bed, tucked in snug and adrift in the Sea of Dreams, you do not wander alone. Riding the waves of your hopes and fears in a rickety, old boat is a poor soul indeed, for he has no dreams of his own. The Fisherman, as he is called, sets out each night, with his nets and his lines, hoping to catch good dreams to take home. He's got sad, beady, black eyes, bushy, grey eyebrows like frowns, and a scraggly bearded chin. His fingers are gnarled and callused, with nails broken and chipped to the nub. He smokes a large pipe and hums to himself as he floats gently about on the dreamscape.

And as you sleep he makes ready and waits for morning, for when you wake, your dreams will scatter, afraid of the day and the dawning of reason. Into his nets, they'll flee and into the tangling lines, to be hauled up by the sad, old Fisherman in his weather beaten boat.

In his boat, he sorts them, digging through the wriggling pile and keeping only the best.

The small ones he'll put back gently, and the weird may give him a chuckle before he gives them a toss. The bad and nasty, with their bloodshot walleyes and fanged, snaggletooth grins try to snap and bite before he throws them away as far as he can.

Finally, when only the tenderest, happiest, and most joyous remain, the Fisherman begins his voyage home, where he'll watch your dreams and pretend they're his own, and for at least a bit, know what it is like to dream. And you'll go about your day, trying to remember that dream that you had last night. You'll know it was good, and you'll glimpse a piece or part of it. But that's all that is left, the rest caught up in the nets, taken back with the Fisherman at the dawn.

It is easy to hate him and call him a crook, this Fisherman who harvests our dreams. But I beg that you don't, for he means no harm. He just wants to try what he'll never know. So if you would be so kind, when you're tucked in tight and ready to sleep tonight, please dream a little dream for the Fisherman.