Jeff Cool has a recurring dream now where he’s back at probie school. An instructor he remembers is talking to his class of 109 guys, and he’s sitting there with the rest of them, listening. The instructor is talking about someone, he’s not sure who. But he’s saying, “He was a good firefighter. But he died. Look around at this class. Some of you guys aren’t going to make twenty years.”
And in the dream, Cool looks around and says to himself, “Well, we’ll see.”
That’s when he usually wakes up.
“Are you ready?” the woman says, fiddling with a digital camera.
“Yes.”
“Smiling is good.”
He smiles.
Flash.
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The Transformation of TV Into an Art Form
The Draw of Dream Worlds in Film
Gosselin, Prince of the Professional Nobodies
A Decade of Defining Moments in Pop-Culture
The Invention of New York's Local Cuisine 
Thirty-Five Short-Lived Looks of the Decade
Two Views of a Swath of the Upper West Side
An Older Generation Moves Into Williamsburg
Ten Years That Changed Everything
A Generation of Overparenting
The Sports Rivalry of the Decade
What Is the Point of the United States Senate? 
