Daydreams of Future Lives

As someone who has reached middle age, depending on how it’s defined these days, I spend time thinking about the future and how I want to spend it. I go for many long walks and use the time to think about my life, what it could look like and what I hope for in the coming years. It’s fun to think sometimes about “Top 10” lists of what I would do with unlimited time, money, and talent, and escapist dreaming can sometimes lead to real changes in life. With that in mind I’ve built my own set of “Top 10” lists, reflecting my crazy – and sometimes not so crazy – ideas of what I would do if nothing was off the table.

Neural Plasticity

·         Take community college classes in every subject, learn a little bit of everything

·         Obtain my Juris Doctorate degree

·         Learn four new languages to a conversational level – Spanish, Italian, French, German

·         Re-learn the Swedish language to full fluency

·         Learn how to play the piano again

·         Read the thousands of books that I’ve wanted to get to for years

·         Learn to see the world clearly enough to draw it with pencil and paper

·         Master Aikido, which I started three decades ago and really enjoyed but then we moved

·         Learn to snowboard, without dislocating my shoulder this time

·         Learn to grow a vegetable garden

Vocation / Contribution

·         Mentor students – anyone who wanted to learn, at any level that I could help teach

·         Volunteer, regularly and consistently, for long enough to make a lasting difference

·         Work in a national park as a forest ranger, repairing trails, or just watching the trees

·         Teach history to high school sophomores and juniors

·         Clean up litter

·         Repair bikes for kids without the means or support to fix their own

·         Operate a bicycle touring company

·         Work as a pro bono lawyer for little stuff that people struggle to figure out on their own

·         Teach kids and adults how to ride bikes safely on city streets

·         Cook for others

Journey Inward

·         Understand different perspectives on moral philosophy well enough to form my own

·         Learn to meditate

·         Make more meaningful connections

Experiential Growth

·         Ride my bike everywhere – Europe, across the US, in the mountains or wherever

·         Hike the Pacific Crest Trail

·         Live as a couple in foreign places long enough to learn the rhythm and the people, including a small village in northern Italy, London, somewhere in South America

·         Visit off-the-beaten-path countries like Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia, etc.

·         Go backcountry camping with my son

·         Eat interesting food in lots of places – not Michelin star restaurants with tweezer food, but food from how people live and feed their own families

·         Have a beer with my wife at every brewery in the Chicagoland area, then do it again in another city, then another, then another…

·         Follow the bands and singers we love, especially to smaller cities like Asheville, Denver, Portland, etc.; see a ton of live music

·         Spend time with both of our families, without anyone talking about politics or religion

·         Professionally guided tours by locals of interesting places with compelling history

Home is Respite

·         Subtract 1500 square feet from my home, turn it into a craftsman ranch

·         Heat my driveway to never have to shovel snow again (I like winter, but not shoveling)

·         Recover our Colorado home from the renter, vacation there for months at a time

·         Have friends over for a firepit night at least once every month

·         Have a dedicated bike workshop room with a door to the outside

·         Keep the dog, magically subtract all the dog hair

·         Heated floors everywhere, once you’ve had them you’ll never go back

·         Relocate the O’Hare airport flight pattern, so the approach to 27C isn’t over our house

·         Build my wife a sunny, warm, peaceful yoga room where she can teach 8-10 friends

·         Add an apartment over the garage, so our son can live with us but not be in our space

It was challenging to come up with fifty dreams and plans. Maybe because I think I’m a pretty practical person, and also because I’m blessed to be able to mostly do the things that I want to do now. I struggled the most with the dreams associated with philosophy and religion, and couldn't come up with more than a few of these. I’m at peace with who I am in this world, and don’t expect there to be a ‘next’ world. I don’t wish for riches or the trappings of wealth, my dreams are in the areas of connecting with the world around us, understanding myself and my family, and doing more of the things that I already love doing. The moon and Mars are for more adventurous souls, and I’m quite fine with that.

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