No Such Thing As a Dragon

I'm gonna tell you a little story to begin this off with, it’s a kids story written for children of about four years of age, but it's very, very elegant

[Chorus]
There's no such thing as a dragon
There’s no such thing as a dragon
There's no such thing as a dragon
There's no such thing as a dragon
[Man] Rawr, rawr, like a dungeon dragon

Well, we all know that dragon is a fictitious creature
Reptilian, terrible, lives forever, breathes fire, hordes gold
A strange combination of attributes
Why would something terrible and ancient hold a treasure?

[Chorus]
There's no such thing as a dragon
There's no such thing as a dragon
There's no such thing as a dragon
There's no such thing as a dragon
[Man] Rawr, rawr, like a dungeon dragon

Billy Bixby was rather surprised when he woke up one morning, and found a dragon in his room
It was a small dragon about the size of a kitten
The dragon wagged its tail happily when Billy patted his head
It's interesting, you know, in Chinese mythology, dragon is a positive figure
In European mythology, the dragon is something to face in combat and destroy
Billy went downstairs to tell his mother
"There’s no such thing as a dragon," said Billy’s mother
And she said it like she meant it

[Chorus]
There's no such thing as a dragon
There’s no such thing as a dragon
There's no such thing as a dragon
There's no such thing as a dragon
[Man] Rawr, rawr, like a dungeon dragon

I remember once my daughter had a nightmare, she was about four
This was at the time when she first started to notice graffiti and litter
Both graffiti and litter bothered her
She couldn't understand the motivations behind the graffiti artists
And she didn’t like the fact that there was litter cluttering up the world's order
Children are really, really dependent on order
And the reason for that has been their realm of competence is rather restricted, so they don't like to see things messed up
She came into our bedroom one night and said, "Dad, I had a nightmare."
Now we all know, right, nightmares aren't real just like dragons
Dreams aren't real, of course, which raises the question of why in the world you bother having them six or seven hours a night, every single day of your life
She said, "I dreamt that there was a clear flowing stream, but in the stream there was all sorts of garbage, and it scared me and bothered me so much, I woke up."
So, I told her, "Look, close your eyes and imagine the stream is full of garbage. What should you do about it?"
And she said, "Well, I should take the garbage out on the stream
I said, "All right, so picture the stream, picture yourself cleaning the garbage out of it."
She calmed down and went back to sleep, why?
Well, because dreams concentrate on threat, we know that they present threats to you
Threats you haven't been able to deal with well
There's a part of your brain that tracks threats, and it's not all that smart in some ways
All it does is say, "Look, here's a problem,"
And it's waiting for the rest of your brain to conjure up some solution to that problem, and if it does it conjure up a solution, then it just presents the problem over, and over, and over, and over, and over, so people who have post-traumatic stress disorder, for example, who've been really upset by their contact with something unexpected, dream about the same tragedy forever until they solve it
And they solve it by facing it and living it
Over and over voluntarily

There's no such thing as a dragon
Over, and over, voluntarily (Why?)
There's no such thing as a dragon
Over, and over, voluntarily (Why?)
There's no such thing as a dragon
Over and over, voluntarily (Why?)
There's no such thing as a dragon
Over and over, voluntarily (Why?)

So you see, Billy
He's pretty much got it right, right off the bat, right?