The Dreamseller: The Calling (19 page)

Just as everything was progressing in perfect harmony, the dreamseller challenged us once again. He invited us to the most charming of all temples, the temple of fashion. In the southern part of the city an exquisite fashion show of famous designers was taking place. The powerful Megasoft Group was again represented by their worldwide chain of feminine apparel called La Femme, which encompassed over ten international designer labels and had two thousand stores in twenty countries.

We found the dreamseller’s invitation bizarre. It seemed like a strange place to sell dreams. After all, we believed that at least in that environment self-esteem had found its most fertile ground.

“What’s the dreamseller looking for in a place like that?” we wondered. “How would he respond to it? Who could he possibly approach?” We were hoping he’d be discreet and not cause a scene, but, at this point, we knew better.

Just getting into the event would be a problem. After all, if we hadn’t succeeded in getting into the computer show, how
would we get into the fashion show—especially looking the way we did?

That day, the dreamseller was wearing a faded, patched black blazer that he’d gotten in a secondhand store and was a size too large. His faded black pants were hemmed oddly and the back pockets were patched with blue cloth. He was wearing a wrinkled moss-green shirt with a few pen stains.

I was wearing a polo shirt and beige pants that I had been given by a traveler who had found his dreams. We were all disheveled, but Bartholomew’s clothes were the funniest and the most ridiculous. A widow who lived near the Europa bridge had given him clothes that belonged to her husband. His yellow pants ended well short of his ankles. His left sock was navy blue and his right sock baby blue. His white T-shirt boasted an eloquent slogan that faithfully reflected his personality: “Don’t follow me. I’m lost, too.” There was no way this ragtag bunch would ever be allowed into the show, I thought.

As we approached the immense hall of the fashion show and carefully watched the exquisitely dressed people, the dreamseller once again scrambled our thinking. He neither gave a speech nor criticized the world of fashion. He said with assurance:

“I’m thinking of calling a few women to sell dreams. How do you feel about that?”

Our roving bachelor pad was rocked. We were an eccentric, admittedly weird group, but we had adapted. We had our differences, but we were adjusting. Our arguments away from the dreamseller were heated but capable of being overcome. Calling women to join our brotherhood seemed like too much. How could it work?

I immediately posed the question: “A woman? I think it’s a bad idea.”

“Why?” he asked.

Luckily, before I could reply, Honeymouth came to my
defense. “They won’t be able to bear this lifestyle. How will they stand to sleep under bridges?”

“What bathroom will they use? What mirror will they use to comb their hair?” asked Solomon. But the dreamseller replied:

“Who said they have to leave their own homes to follow us? After all, everyone should sell dreams, whether to himself or to others, wherever he—or she—is.”

For the first time, his words brought us no relief. We didn’t believe a woman could participate in the group. We considered ourselves revolutionaries, protagonists of a fantastic sociological experiment. We didn’t want to share our macho glory. Infected by discrimination, we thought that women would diminish our boldness.

“Following you, Dreamseller, is for . . . real men, and good ones. Besides, women talk too much and act too little,” Angel Hand said with conviction. Then he realized his arrogance and tried to backpedal. We had taken over the dreamseller’s project and given it a masculine feel.

The Miracle Worker also was against the dreamseller’s proposal. He used his knowledge of theology in an effort to dissuade him.

“Dreamseller, Buddha, Confucius and Jesus all had men as disciples. Why would you want to call women to follow you? Look at history. It’ll never work.”

For the first time, the group was unanimous in showering praise on the Miracle Worker. We began to think he could make interesting contributions. Nevertheless, the dreamseller had an answer for our theologian.

“When Jesus called his disciples, where did he put them, at the periphery or at the center of his plans?” he asked.

“The center, of course,” the Miracle Worker replied without hesitation.

“And women?” he asked, testing him.

Edson thought, reflected and rubbed his forehead. After a prolonged moment of analysis, he answered shrewdly:

“I can’t say at the periphery, because they provided material support, but they weren’t at the center of his work, because they weren’t active participants in his project.”

Wow,” I thought to myself. I had always thought Edson wasn’t much of a logical thinker, but he was proving me wrong.

Then, the dreamseller looked at him and then at all of us.

“Wrong,” he said, then fell silent.

Because I had studied these sacred texts, I thought Edson was right. I waited for the dreamseller’s arguments, but suspected this time he wouldn’t convince us.

“They were always at the center of the project. First, according to Scripture, God didn’t choose a caste of Pharisees, Greek philosophers or priests to raise the young Jesus, but a woman, an adolescent uncontaminated by the ruling class, someone outside the system.”

“Second, the first person who talked about Jesus was a female, the Samaritan woman. She had lived a promiscuous life, been with many men, but his words were enough to satiate her hunger. She gathered her people and spoke of the man who had moved her.” After uttering these words, he stopped to take a breath and took ours away by adding, “A prostitute was more noble than the religious leaders of his time.”

Bartholomew came out with a phrase that broke the tension hanging over us. I don’t know how he came up with such imagination.

“Chief, I’ve always thought women were smarter than men. The problem is, the credit card was invented . . .” And he started laughing. Ironically, he’d given the impression that he was the one who had supported the women in his life. In reality, they had supported him.

The dreamseller, unhappy with our prejudiced masculinity, attacked even further. He asked our acting theologian:

“Tell me, Edson. In the most important moment in Jesus’ life, when his body was withering on the cross and his heart was weak, where were the men, at the center or at the periphery of his plan?”

Edson, paling, was slow to answer. And our faces were flushed. In the silence, the dreamseller said:

“His disciples were heroes when he was shaking the world, but they were cowards when the world came crashing down on him; they kept quiet, fled, denied they knew him, betrayed him. But even then, he loved. Men, I say again, are more timid than women.”

“But don’t men make war? Bear arms? Don’t they start revolutions?” the sociologist in me blurted out.

“The weak use weapons; the strong, their words,” he answered and asked the question we feared most:

“Where were the women when he was dying?”

Humbly, because we were familiar with the Bible, we muttered, “Near the cross.”

“More than anything, they were at the epicenter of his project. And do you know why? Because women are stronger, more intelligent, more humane, generous, altruistic, supportive, tolerant, faithful and sensible than men. Suffice it to say that ninety percent of violent crimes are committed by men.”

We were stunned by so many favorable adjectives about women. The dreamseller didn’t seem like a feminist, nor did he appear to be trying to cast words into the air in an effort to compensate for millennia of discrimination against women. He seemed totally convinced of what he was saying.

To him, the system that controlled humanity was conceived in the hearts of men, although its creators could never imagine that one day they would become the victims of their own creation. It was time for women to come into the picture and sell dreams. Lots and lots of dreams.

T
HE DREAMSELLER GAVE US FAIR WARNING. HE REMINDED
us that the most cultured of Jesus’s disciples, Judas, betrayed him. The strongest, Peter, denied knowing him. And the rest, except John, ran in fear. After demonstrating masculine fragility and feminine greatness, the dreamseller revealed why he was in the temple of fashion.

He told us that in the past, the male-dominated system had subjugated women, burning them, stoning them, silencing them. In time, they freed themselves and partially reclaimed their rights. He paused and, out loud, said the number “one.” This numerical citation in the middle of a speech made me uneasy. I’d seen how that movie ended.

The dreamseller noted that women had begun to vote, to excel in the academic world, to increase their numbers in the corporate sphere, to occupy the most varied social areas. Women had become more and more daring. They began to change vital sectors of society, to introduce tolerance, solidarity, affection and romanticism. But the system was unforgiving about their audacity.

It set for them the most cowardly and underhanded trap. Instead of extolling their intelligence and obvious sensitivity, it began to exalt the female body as never before in history. It
was used tirelessly to sell products and services. They started to feel special. It seemed as if modern societies were trying to make up for millennia of rejection and intolerance. The dreamseller paused to take a breath.

Staring at the immense, colorful temple of fashion, he became outraged and in a loud voice began inviting people to talk about what was so great about the latest fashions. Nothing could be odder for someone dressed like him. But, since the fashion world makes room for the eccentric, they all thought he represented some designer rebelling against conventions. We felt out of place seeing such finely dressed people around us. Some of them recognized him.

He quickly began a discourse about his controversial ideas:

“When women came to feel they occupied the throne of the male-dominated system, the fashion world locked in on the most subtle stereotype.” And he recited the number “two,” deeply saddened.

I didn’t know where the dreamseller was heading with this. I knew that stereotypes are a sociological problem. The stereotype of the crazy person, the addict, the corrupt politician, the socialist, the bourgeois, the Jew, the terrorist, the homosexual. We use stereotypes as a vile standard to brand people with certain behaviors. We don’t evaluate the content of their character; if they show certain characteristics, we immediately imprison them behind the bars of a stereotype, classifying them as junkies, corrupt, unstable.

But what does the beautiful world of fashion have to do with stereotypes? The women were free to wear whatever they wanted, to buy any clothes they fancied, and have the body they desired. I didn’t understand why the dreamseller was so concerned. Nevertheless, the more he spoke, the more I was impressed.

“What a crime that what the fashion world has stereotyped as ‘beautiful’ is nothing more than a genetic accident.”

Bartholomew wasn’t sure what the dreamseller was talking about.

“Chief, is that stereotype expensive?” he asked, thinking it was some kind of clothing. The dreamseller told him:

“Its implications are extremely expensive,” he explained. “To maximize sales and create an ideal image for women, the fashion world began using the bodies of uncommonly thin young women as the epitome of beauty. One young woman out of ten thousand with a very thin body and exceedingly well-formed face, hips, nose, bust and neck became the stereotype of beauty. What consequences that had for the collective consciousness . . .”

More and more people were gathering around. After a brief pause, he continued:

“The genetic exception became the rule. Children looked to their Barbie dolls for direction, and adolescent girls turned runway models into an unattainable standard of beauty. That process engendered a compulsive quest for the stereotype, as if it were a drug, in hundreds of millions of women. Women, who were always more generous and supportive than men, turned on each other without realizing it. Even Chinese and Japanese women are mutilating their anatomy to come closer to the beauty of Western models. Did you know that?”

I didn’t know that, but how could he? How could someone completely outside of fashion be so well informed about it? Suddenly, he interrupted my thoughts by uttering the number “three,” and a moment of sorrow washed over his face.

He continued by saying that such a distorted model of beauty had sunk into the collective unconscious, imploding women’s self-image and committing an act of terrorism against self-esteem. In the past, stereotypes didn’t have serious collective consequences because we weren’t yet a global village. And just when women thought they liberated themselves, the system clipped their wings with the “Barbie syndrome.”

A male designer challenged him tensely, “I don’t believe any of that. That’s ridiculous.”

“I wish it were. I would love for my ideas to be foolish.” And he spoke the number “four.”