Live Free & Be Happy!

I'm back! I've selected a title I've used before for this first blog post in nearly a year. The photo is of the hat I currently sport and travel in. More about it later.

It's been nearly a year since I posted anything new on this blog. I started to ease back on my writing about two years ago. No! I hadn't run out of topics. I actually have a long list of topics I continue to accumulate. I'd like to attribute my taking time off to writer's block, but it wasn't that either. I guess I simply needed to take a break, evaluate life, regroup and, to probably be really honest, I got lazy. I love to write. I love to share my thoughts, philosophies and even an occasional rant. I was tired.

In May of 2017 I rushed back to the east side of the continent to attend the 50^th Class Reunion of my college class at Montclair State University.

52 Weeks to a Simpler Life – Tip #11 – Reevaluate Your Expectations and Make Changes.

We are well into the 21^st Century. That still seems a bit strange when I say it or write it. I'm a product of the 20^th Century and, most likely, so are you. While I'm not officially a “Baby Boomer,” I was born a year earlier than the Boomer generation has been defined to begin, I still grew up as part of that generation. Those were good times and those were bad times. Those of us who are Boomers were initially defined by the aftermath of the Great Depression and World War II.

Our parents wanted us to have better lives than they had. That's not unusual. I believe all parents since the beginning of time want their offspring to have lives better than they had. That's probably never been truer than during the past couple centuries as technology advanced at ever more accelerating rates. Those of us born in the 40's were actually around before or at the time the first 12” 33 1/3 and 7” 45 rpm phonograph records were introduced. Since then we've gone through those records, the 4 track and 8 track cartridge, the compact audio cassette, the CD, the Philips Digital Cassette, Digital Audio Tape (DAT), flash memory mp3 players, the iPod and now streaming and downloadable music formats. And that's just one small facet of our ever expanding technological world.

Benefits or Entitlements

Benefits and entitlements, are they one and the same or are they different breeds of animals? There seems to be a trend for those in the bureaucracy of federal (and even state) government toward calling anything they pay out to citizens as entitlements. Now, I'm not sure. Is it because I'm becoming a crotchety old man (NOT)? Or, is it because those in the elected offices, their high ranking appointees and the massive legion of high level bureaucrats are using governmentspeak or doublespeak to get us to believe something that isn't true.

Would this be the first time the government has attempted (and often succeeded) in duping the "flock?" I think not. That is a huge topic for another time. However, as humans, we are basically pack animals. Although, it's probably more accurate to say we're like flock or herd animals. Watch cattle in the pasture sometime. When it's milking time they all line up one behind the other and follow the leader right into the milk barn. A new word becomes the "in" word to use in the pop culture - cool, dude, awesome, right on, righteous, bro, etc. All of a sudden, it slips into our vocabulary and pretty soon we're all using it. . . READ MORE

Photo-of-the-Week - Contrast in Americana - The Old And The New, North East, Pennsylvania, July 2014

This photo op jumped out at me as I was crossing from northwestern New York State into northwestern Pennsylvania on a recent trek. North East is actually the name of the township in northwestern Pennsylvania. Is that clear? Maybe as clear as mud, huh?

The contrast was so stark as I passed this sight that I turned around and went back to capture this photo. There stood an old Dairy Queen soft-serve ice cream stand back to back with a modern Circle K convenience store. . . READ MORE

Photo-of-the-Week #156, Home #4, The Birth of My Ham Radio Hobby, Clifton, New Jersey, September 2013

This Photo-of-the-Week Marks the 156th such post in this series of photos and I don't believe I've missed a week since I launched it. However, this will be the last post of this series after three years. The Photo-of-the-Week series moves to my Travel blog that you'll be able to access by clicking on the "Traveling" tab above. So, "the beat rolls on" just in a slightly modified manner.

This photo is of the fourth home my parents owned, three of them were in my hometown of Clifton, New Jersey. There were two other places we lived prior to the homes they owned, but they were rental properties. The homes my parents owned represented the post-WWII emergence of a growing Middle Class in the U.S. The American Dream was to own a home, have a nice car (eventually, two cars and, in our family, we eventually had three). This was the house we moved from, on the mountain in Bloomingdale that was my favorite, when we returned to Clifton .

Every home we lived in brings back vivid memories. For those people who grew up in only one or two homes, memories may blur into a continuum. But, since we moved fairly frequently, each home is like an era unto itself. This split-level house actually had four levels. There is a basement below the living room, dining room and kitchen on the right side of the house. That basement has special significance to me.

So, what are the memories I have for the three years we lived here at 40 Manor Drive? First, we returned to Clifton just in time for me to start junior high school at Woodrow Wilson Jr. High (7th through 9th grades). I also acquired my newspaper route and began my "entrepreneurial" career in this house. I delivered the evening newspaper for The Herald News six days a week to 108 customers and collected payment for the papers every Saturday morning. I became quite active in the jr. high Baptist Youth Fellowship that I eventually became vice-president and then president of. This began my leadership opportunities.

The space to the right of the garage was unfinished when we moved into the house, so my father built in a recreation room (as they called them back then), a half bathroom and a laundry room in that space. When he built the laundry room, he set it up so that I could also use it as a darkroom for my fledgling photography hobby. In the back yard, to the right of the house, behind the large shrubs, my father set up our first, of two, large, above ground swimming pools that provided for a lot of summer fun.

My bedroom was above the family room, (the double windows on the second floor over the double windows of the family room). It was in this bedroom that my interest was peaked and my amateur radio hobby was born. We had, from somewhere, acquired an old console radio, dating back to the later 30's or 40's. I believe it was a Philco. I managed to cram that big old radio into my closet, straightened out a coat hanger and turned it into an antenna. I would sit and swelter (from the heat created by all the vacuum tubes and transformers) in that closet for hours listening to shortwave radio stations and ham radio operators around the world. I also began reading the Tommy Tomkins stories SOS at Midnight and CQ Ghost Ship. Tommy was a fictional high school senior and ham radio operator who used his hobby to solve mysteries. These books probably launched more young teens into ham radio during the '60s than almost anything else.

There was a ham radio operator, Jack Nixon, W2IMG, who lived about 15 minutes from our house by bike. Jack was a science teacher in a neighboring town. He was also the person who helped me get started and administered my first two amateur radio exams. I was 13 in 1958, just shy of my 14th birthday, when I took my Novice exam. The license arrived from the FCC right after I turned 14 and I was issued the call sign WV2FMT (changed within a year to WA2FMT when I upgraded my license). I still carry that call sign, WA2FMT, to this date, 55 years later. 

There was really no room in my bedroom for even a small ham radio station, so my father took about half of the basement under the living room and built in another room that he designed as my "Ham Shack." The rest of the basement was workshop. I even had my own extension telephone in my ham shack. Back in the 50's kids didn't have their own extensions, so I was an anomaly. My father ran antenna cables and a control cable to the roof and to the back yard. On the roof he installed my 2-meter (144 MHz) beam antenna and my 15-meter (21 MHz) beam antenna along with the rotator to turn the antennas toward whomever I was in contact with. In the back yard, I had a 40-meter (7 MHz) long-wire, dipole antenna. This gave me the capability of communicating locally, throughout the U.S. and around the world. This was pretty heady stuff for a 13 or 14-year-old kid back in those days.

Thus, while house #3 was my favorite house, House #4 really was the launching pad for, pretty much, my entire future. The ham radio antennas are long gone. The truck farm that bordered our backyard when we moved into the house was sold while we lived there and developed into more homes. The swimming pool is also long gone (at least as far as I could see from the street). But, I know the recreation room, half bathroom and the laundry room, where I developed film and enlarged black and white prints from my early photography days, are still there. I know the bedroom over the family room where my interest in shortwave and ham radio was conceived is still there. And, I'm reasonably sure the "ham shack" in the basement, although repurposed, is very likely still there, too.

The house is a different color now. I've been wracking my memory trying to remember what the original color was. I think it was brown. Otherwise the house and the neighborhood appear to look pretty much unchanged. However, while I'm sure most or all of the people who owned the homes along Manor Drive have since left the Earth, my memories are still very much alive and legion 54 years later. 

Change! The ONLY Thing You Can Count On!

LOOK AT ME!!!!

Sigh! I'm a bit melancholy today. Oh! Life is great and this trek is still a magnificent statement about my personal freedom. My melancholy is because, while I generally accept and deal with change very well, there are just those few things that one wants to hold onto.

Let me elaborate a little. I've spent the last few days in the Ocala, Florida area. Nearby are The Villages (about 20 miles south), Silver Springs, the beautiful crystal clear spring fed lake where they have the glass bottom boats and Ocala National Forest. Each of these has some significance to me.

The Villages

 

The Villages is the latest thing that has some significance for me. The first time I visited The Villages was in 2005, I believe. I have two friends who moved from Winchester, Virginia, my home area for some 26 or 27 years to The Villages in 2004. My friend Carolyn and I toured The Villages in 2005 and were, like most people from the Baby Boomer and the Greatest Generation, pretty enthralled with what we saw and experienced. It literally is about as close to the perfect hometown as one could want. It has everything anyone might want. It is safe, quiet and clean. There is always something to do. There are all kinds of entertainment, live and movies 365 days a year. It's pretty much perfect. My thought was once one moved to The Villages one wouldn't leave very often, if ever, because everything one could want was there.

It had a population of about 75,000 in 2005. Move forward to 2014, nine years later. The population has now topped 100,000. There is still a substantial amount of room in the more than 550 square miles, by some estimates, including water. Approximately 30 square miles is developed into homes, retail, medical facilities, golf courses and a plethora of other recreational facilities. If, The Villages ever fills out most of the estimated 550 square miles, it will be one of the largest city areas in the United States, beating out New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago and San Francisco.

And there lies the rub for me. While it's nearly perfect with an A rated charter school system, a 200 plus (and doubling) hospital, plus a planned satellite hospital, a 99,000 sq. ft. VA full-service medical clinic, a ridiculously low crime rate and all the shopping and recreation one could want, it's becoming a BIG CITY! A big city means TOO MANY PEOPLE and too many people means TRAFFIC and CONGESTION. So, while, in 2005 I was enthralled and could even see myself living in this place, in 2014, it has bypassed me. It just isn't worth dealing with all the people, traffic and congestion to avail myself of the few amenities I would take advantage of. Alas, it has changed.

Ocala National Forest

Ocala National Forest is one of the oldest national forests in the U.S. My first experience was 49 years ago at the age of 20. Actually, I could even say probably dating back to around 59 years ago, plus or minus a couple years, when my parents brought us kids to Silver Springs on the edge of Ocala National Forest. Some time in the not too distant past Silver Springs was taken over by the Florida State Park system and Ocala National Forest and it's tourist attractions was taken over about 20 years ago by a concessionaire. A lot has changed since my earliest experiences.

Silver Springs

Silver Springs is no longer the busy, vibrant tourist attraction it was in the days of my youth. As I said, it was been taken over by the state when the private owners could no longer maintain it as a viable business. Such attractions as Disney World, Epcot Center, Sea World and Universal Studios, to mention a few drew all the tourist and vacation travelers to Orlando and with I-95, I-75 and I-4 making it infinitely easier to get to Orlando, Ocala and Silver Springs were bypassed.

Today, an $8.00 per car pass gets you into the parking lot and the only attractions that are available are a ride on the glass bottom boats on the crystal clear water of the spring fed lake and a restaurant. Everything else is "being renovated" whatever that means. Needless to say, I saved my $8.00 and moved on. Alas, things have changed.

Juniper Springs

I first visited Juniper Springs 49 years ago this upcoming summer. I was 20 years old and going into my junior year in college in New Jersey. The year before (at 19), I took the last vacation with my family when we all came to Daytona Beach and I met the lovely and cute Jane. Jane was a native born Floridian who grew up in Daytona Beach. She was still in high school when we met, going into her senior year, I believe. Jane and I corresponded (the old fashioned way, by written letters) for the next year. So, the next summer when I was 20, grabbed a couple buddies and off we went to Daytona Beach to meet up with Jane and a couple of her girlfriends. One of the places Jane took us all was Ocala National Forest and, as I remember, Juniper Springs and Alexander Springs. To us Jersey boys, these springs were remarkable.

Well, I visited Juniper Springs a few years ago. And things have changed. As I mentioned, about 20 years ago a concessionaire took over all the tourist attractions in Ocala National Forest including Juniper Springs. When I was there 49 years ago they were free for public use and they were pretty much still in their natural state. Today there is a fee for camping or day use. Albeit, not very much, with my Senior National Park pass, I only paid $2.50, but it wasn't free. There were defined parking areas, signage of all kinds, modern restrooms and change areas (bathing suits) a concession stand and, well, frankly, it didn't seem to resemble what I recalled from 49 years ago. Disappointment!

Alexander Springs

Yesterday I visited Alexander Springs. Sigh! Once again, it had a fee, defined parking, signage, canoe and kayak rentals, a fee to scuba dive, a day fee, a camping fee, modern restrooms and change areas (a nice improvement) and a concession stand. My recollection of the springs was, again, very different than what I found. I recall there being a hole in the center of the springs I was told went down around 100 feet with caves where scuba divers would go down to and explore the small caves. I was told it was only about 25 or so feet deep where the caves are. It was crystal clear (as was Juniper Springs), but 49 years ago I could see the divers way down at the bottom. Today, I couldn't see anything.

There was also a stream that led off the springs that was a form of wet nature trail and we walked that stream until we reached a sign with a skull and crossbones indicating this was as far as we should go because beyond that point we would encounter alligators and water snakes. And at one point we passed a place where two other streams fed into the main stream and the water from the two other streams were different colors and didn't blend into the water in the main stream bed. I'm guessing, scientifically, that some natural minerals caused the water colors and the density of the water was different than the main streambed, thus, they didn't blend. No stream was apparent any longer. I asked the concession attendant and he indicated there had been a stream off the springs, but it had pretty much dried up and was only apparent as some marshy spots. He said it hadn't been around as long as he had worked there. He was only 47, so he wasn't even born when I first visited the springs.

Our Memories

So, it goes back to what I keep telling people. The only thing that really is ours is our memories. Most things are fleeting and as the world (and this country) keeps growing in population at exponential rates, we're going to find more and more things changing, The Villages, Silver Springs, Alexander Springs and Juniper Springs are only a speck in the overall scheme of things. When I get back up north to my storage unit I'm going to find my "Chest of Life" where I still have pictures of my Juniper and Alexander Springs experience from 49 years ago and see how accurate my memory was as I revisited these places from my past.

Life is short! The older you get the less life there is to experience all the wonders of this world. And, as each passing year goes by, because of the population density, there are more and more restrictions and limitations on so many of the things that were once open and free to experience. I guess the key is to stop putting off life and DO IT NOW!

So Much To Do, So Little Time To Do It!

I'm sure you've said that yourself. It seems to be a pretty common theme in this complicated time we live in. Glenn Morrissette of To Simplify and Gary Arndt of Everything, Everywhere, two of the nomadic bloggers I follow, regularly seem to express this or similar sentiments. Believe it or not, it takes a lot to live a simple, frugal, nomadic, free lifestyle. I know! You're saying, "Stop complaining, you don't have a "rut job," fixed residence, spouse/family, etc. to be responsible for" . . . and you're right! But, that doesn't mean there aren't responsibilities and matters that have to be addressed even for someone who is "living free."

I have soooooo many photos I've been taking. Gary Arndt has to plan time off the road just to go through and edit all his photos and I'm in complete accord with Gary. Glenn, who used to post something everyday while on the road has started to cut back to every other day or even every three days most of the time now. Some of his posts consist of only photos with little or no text. Now, I love writing, but it takes some concentrated and focused time to write something that's both meaningful (I hope) and comprehensible. Adding some photos takes additional time. So, it starts to become a series of choices I have to make. Do I roll on and see things, meet interesting people, experience new things including wonderful new local eateries or do I sit somewhere in My McVansion and write, write, write. I'm looking for the balance, friends. I know it exists.

Today, as I compose this shorter than usual post, I'm in the parking lot of the Walmart Motor Inn (bring your own accommodations) on Wedgewood Lane in The Villages. The Villages, for those not from or familiar with Florida or not of retirement age (over 55) is the fastest growing retirement community in the U.S. It's located in central Florida, north of Orlando, south of Gainesville and roughly equal distance from the Atlantic coast and the Gulf coast. The current population of The Villages is slightly north of 100,000 folks - all 55 or older. It was the vision of a man who started it about 40 years ago and since his passing is run by his family. This guy saw what the Baby Boomer generation was going to want long before they knew what they were going to want. It's darn near about as perfect a small city as anyone could imagine. There is so much to do here that once someone moves here, it's likely they'll never want to leave and travel anywhere else. That may be a bit of an exaggeration. But, I've heard more than a few people say that. It was pretty darn fantastic when I was here about nine years ago and it's only gotten bigger and better since then, even through the real estate bubble busting and the recession.

So, yesterday I enjoyed lunch with an old friend who moved here from Winchester, Virginia ten years ago. I had dinner with another old friend who moved here from Winchester, last evening. It was great catching up with both of them and they are both completely happy with their lives here in The Villages. It turned a bit chilly yesterday with mist and some rain. Today it's a bit chillier, yet and it's overcast, rainy and misty, again. Shortly, I'm going to pull up tent stakes and head around The Villages on a little reconnaissance mission to capture photos of all the points of interest including the new (third) town center that has been constructed, or better stated is under construction, yet. If it grows like the other two, it will be a very large little town with all kinds of shopping and entertainment. And each town has a town square where there is live entertainment every evening, 365 days a year. I'm also going to stop at The Villages own radio station and plug my friend, Mickey Bo's, Rock N Roll Revue radio program he's syndicating.

From here I'm heading back over toward the Gulf coast for a few days and hope the weather will warm back up and get sunny again. I'll be meeting some more new friends over there, enjoying their company and attempting to get caught up on some writing and photo editing.

So, keep tuned and I'll get you caught up on the highlights of this trek and adventure. 

Who Wants To Be A Billionaire - Part II

So, what better day is there to talk about being a billionaire than Thanksgiving Day? I hope by the end of this post you'll realize that, if you haven't been before, today you'll be a multi-millionaire or a billionaire.

Let's start out with the answers to the six questions I gave you in the last post.

Question #1. How old are YOU?

A. 29

B. 43

C. 68

D. __ (Enter Your Age)

Only YOU know this answer, so you either entered your real age in D. or I happened to select your actual age by some random chance. Whatever your age actually is, be proud of it. Your life is richer for each extra day you live so forget all that perpetual "39" stuff. You're not Jack Benny and he was only 39 once just like the rest of us. By the way, C., 68, is my final answer.

Question #2. What year were you born?

A. 1984

B. 1970

C. 1945

D. ____ (Enter the Year YOU were born)

Once again, only YOU know what year you were born. Some significant things happened that particular year and one of them, the most important one to you, is that you were born. In this case, C., again, 1945, is my final answer.

Question #3. What is the current average Social Security actuarial life expectancy male/female for the year you were born?

A. 77.5 years/82 years

B. 78.5 years/82.5 years

C. 83.5 years/86 years

D. ________ (Your life expectancy based on your current age, when you were born and your gender)

There are numerous ways you can calculate this. There are all kinds of life expectancy calculators and actuarial charts on the Internet. So, there really isn't any one answer that is THE answer. In my case, my final answer is C., yet, again, 83.5 years (since I'm a male). I chose the Social Security actuarial life expectancy chart for this particular post simply because, well, it's simple. If you don't know your life expectancy you can go to http://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html to calculate yours. The number is just approximate unless you were born on January 1st of your birth year. Also, I rounded up or down depending on the fraction. But, it will give you a reasonable idea. Oh, and if you've already passed your expected life expectancy, you really have something to crow about.

Another interesting side note is that when I was born in 1945, my life expectancy was only 63 at that time. So, I'm very happy to have passed that date already.

Question #4. By what age do you become a millionaire?

A. Age 1

B. Age 29

C. Age 43

D. Age 68

This is the first question you actually had to think about. If your answer was anything other than A. Age 1, you are wrong. But, that's okay because you still win.

Question #5. By what age do you break 100 million?

A. Age 43

B. Age 29

C. Age 4

D. Age 68

This one also required you to think a little. And the correct answer is C. Age 4. Yep! Believe it or not you've already exceeded 100 million before you started Kindergarten.

Question #6. (Final Question) By what age do you become a billionaire?

A. Age 68

B. Age 32

C. Age 29

D. Age 43

Now, the answer to this question is a little more thought provoking? Your final answer is B., 32. That's right you are a billionaire by age 32.

How Does This Work?

Okay, you just checked your bank accounts, your IRA or 401K, the value of your home, if you own it and it's fully paid off and all your other assets and they in no way indicate that you are worth either a million or more or a billion or more dollars. As of the latest compiled report in 2009, only .15% of the world's population has a net worth in excess of a million dollars. Interestingly, the number of millionaires in the U.S. declined by 27% in 2008. There were 2.5 million less than the year before and the lowest number since 2003.

And as far as that billionaire figure, the numbers diminish considerable. Billionaires represent just .0000286% of the world population of approximately seven billion. The United States has the largest number of billionaires followed by China, a distant second (there were no billionaires in China a decade ago) and Russia follows China. The combined net worth of all the billionaires in the world is either equal to or has exceeded the entire gross economy of China, the second largest economy in the world. And who is the wealthiest man in the world? Well, it's none other than that college drop-out, Bill Gates, who surpassed Mexico's Carlos Slim making Gates the wealthiest man in the U.S. and in the World.

Let's face reality, folks. If any of the readers of this blog were worth millions or billions of dollars, I sincerely doubt that you'd be reading this right now. It's not that some of the ideas and information that flow through these posts might not be helpful or even valuable for those with more money than they know what to do with. It's simply that they are too busy figuring out what to do with the money they have and compounding it into more. So, let me state right now. You are not and probably will never be (nor will I) a financial multi-millionaire or billionaire. To be honest, I've generated and been responsible for multiple millions of dollars over my lifetime. However, those were business revenues, not personal wealth. It would have been nice to have kept a couple of the large checks out of every ten I wrote and signed. But, that wasn't my lot in life. Maybe I wasn't bright enough or didn't have the business acumen or money management skills or best ideas or . . . well, you get the idea. We've all questioned ourselves over things like this during our lifetimes. The reality is that it was probably a little of all of them, except the business ideas. Many of the ideas I came up with were exploited by others and did extremely well. My challenge was always my timing and having enough working capital.

If It's Not Money, What Is It?

Okay, so let's look at your millionaire and billionaire status. You see? Every one of us was born with more wealth than we could have ever imagined. The challenge most, if not all, people face is not recognizing that wealth and then squandering it over a lifetime. Wealth doesn't have to be in a tangible form. Money, fiat, currency or whatever you want to call it is simply a means of barter. We exchange some form of coins, usually representing some precious metal, or paper money that we can also call bank notes for products and services, tangible and intangible that we desire. Most people spend their lives working or providing some kind of physical service in exchange for a certain value in paper and coins that can then be used to acquire products and services we need or desire including shelter, food, clothes, transportation, recreation, etc. Throughout history, no matter what culture or civilization you want to refer to, there was some form of trading or bartering products and services. The current system of cash, checks, debit and credit cards are simply a convenient way to accomplish the same thing. But, in virtually all cases there is one element or intangible commodity that is a constant since the beginning . . . TIME!

Time is the most precious commodity we have. I would go as far as to say that time is priceless. Unfortunately, few of us ever learn or even realize this until more than 50% or even 75% of our time has been spent, lost, stolen, borrowed or squandered. We are taught and conditioned to understand the "value" of money and we sometimes even learn money "management." But, few are ever taught the value of their time and how to manage it to their best advantage. We put values on our time without realizing how cheaply we're giving it away. For example, when someone accepts a minimum wage job, they are putting a value on their time of approximately $7.50 for each hour or 3,600 seconds. That's how many seconds there are in each hour.

Let's do a little simple multiplication. If there are 3,600 seconds in an hour, then there are 86,400 seconds in a day, 604,800 seconds in a week, and 31,449,600 seconds in a year. You are already a multi-millionaire, not just a millionaire. But, at the $7.50 rate of pay, your financial time is only worth $65,520 for all your time that year. If you increased that pay rate to $25.00/hour you'd increase the financial value of your time to $209,664 for the same 31,449,600 seconds. So, in less than five years your financial value for your time is worth over a million dollars. Of course, none of us are going to trade the 31,449,600 seconds each year for financial remuneration. However, there are lots of ways to have your time and, at the same time, have your financial wealth working for you while you're doing other things with your priceless time. Remember, most of the financial millionaires and billionaires are self-made. Many of them do not have college degrees (including the current wealthiest man in the world). If they can start out with nothing and become financially well off, so can you and I. We don't need, or at least I don't, as much money as these über rich folks. I simply need enough to live my life and dreams the way I choose to. I'll wager, when the rubber meets the road, that's all you need, too.

But, here is my reality and possibly yours. What value does life have to me if I have a finite number of years to live, if my focus is on converting my priceless commodity that I was given at birth, my time, to money or financial wealth? Am I richer spending my time working for financial wealth and missing out on all the wealth of nature, family, friends, travel and the many other pursuits available to me. Or, am I smarter to use my time to my own, personal best interest instead of selling myself cheap in exchange for money? Oh! I hear you saying now, "But, I have to make money and sell my time so I can have shelter, food, clothes, health care and all the bottom level needs on Maslow's pyramid." Yes! You do need those things. And, not only that, but you also need to enjoy some of the wants that you'll develop. Those are rewards we owe ourselves. But, do we need it all? Are those financially wealthy millionaires and billionaires really all that happy? Are they really free? Sure, their lives may look glamorous, but are they enjoying their priceless commodity of time any more than those who value that time more.

Here's a question? Steve Jobs, a brilliant man and a self-made billionaire, died from pancreatic cancer. He was in his 50's at the time of his passing away. Did all that money save his life? He may have been able to buy a little extra time (actually, you can't truly buy time), but how much of his fortune do you think he would have expended if he could have actually bought more time with his wife and family and doing many of the things he put off until some unknown time in the future that never came for him? We've created this concept of having a, so-called, "bucket list" that raised awareness because of a couple actors and a screenwriter with a movie. The term didn't exist prior to the movie in 2006 or 2007.

So, I suggest that you and everyone you know have been millionaires since your first year on this planet and billionaires for most of your life. If I live to my expected Social Security age of approximately 83.5 years, I will have expended over 2.6 billion priceless seconds. Personally, I'm hoping for a lot more years after that 83.5 mark. After all, I've already passed the original 63 year mark established when I was born. How about you? How much are your seconds, minutes, hours and days worth to you? What would you give? What would you pay, if you were lying in your deathbed, to spend a few more years, months, weeks, days, hours or even minutes and seconds doing something you always dreamed of doing or sharing time with those you love. Is there really enough money that you could pay for that time if it were even possible? So, why not live like the billionaire you are? Do what you REALLY want to do with your life. Experience life to its fullest so when you finally close your eyes on this "experience," you take with you the most fulfilled dreams and the least regrets for the time that you gave away, had stolen from you or just plain squandered.

Who Wants To Be A Billionaire? ME! And thankfully, I discovered my intangible wealth before it is too late? And you?

Who Wants To Be A Billionaire?

You may be familiar with the TV game show "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire" that began in England and has a U.S. version as well as versions in other countries around the world. If you know the program, you know that the host asks a contestant a question and gives them four choices to select the correct answer from. Each time they answer correctly their winnings increase up to $1,000,000.00. Of course, there are curves and pitfalls in the process to make it interesting. The contestant can quit after each question and take their winnings up to that point and leave. If they continue and miss a question, the game is over and they left the game with a certain prescribed amount depending on what level question they missed. Well, the show has been on the air in the U.S. since 1999 in network and syndication form and has been judged to be about the 6th most popular game show of all time out of 60 in the rankings.

But, I have a different game I want to play with you. I call it "Who Wants To Be A Billionaire" and it only has a few questions to answer. The rules are simple, answer the questions correctly and you win. Answer the questions incorrectly and you STILL win. "What kind of game is this?" you're probably asking. I can't lose. What great odds. So, here goes. Today you get the questions. Tomorrow, you get the correct answers.

Question #1. How old are YOU?

A. 29

B. 43

C. 68

D. __ (Enter Your Age)

Question #2. What year were you born?

A. 1984

B. 1970

C. 1945

D. ____ (Enter the Year YOU were born)

Question #3. What is the current average Social Security actuarial life expectancy male/female for the year you were born?

A. 77.5 years/82 years

B. 78.5 years/82.5 years

C. 83.5 years/86 years

D. ________ (Your life expectancy based on your current age, when you were born and your gender)

Question #4. By what age do you become a millionaire?

A. Age 1

B. Age 29

C. Age 43

D. Age 68

Question #5. By what age do you break 100 million?

A. Age 43

B. Age 29

C. Age 4

D. Age 68

Question #6. (Final Question) By what age do you become a billionaire?

A. Age 68

B. Age 32

C. Age 29

D. Age 43

Have you determined your final answers? I hope you have. These are all very simple questions. And, as I said earlier, this game has great odds. You can't lose.

I had a college professor in my senior year who ran his philosophy course on a very similar set of rules. At the outset of the class he told everyone in the class they would receive an A for the course. He said he would be there for every class, but it was voluntary for the students to attend since they already had the A for the course. There would be reading assignments and written assignments, but again, reading and doing the written assignments were voluntary. There was a mid-term and a final exam, however, he would supply all the questions in advance and the exams would be open book exams. In other words, there was no way to flunk this course. We all won whether we participated or not. I'll tell you the outcome of this class when I explain the correct answers to the six questions in the "Who Wants To Be A Billionaire?" game.

Tune in to the next post for all the answers.

Work . . . W-O-R-K!

(Note: I began this post on Monday, thought I'd finish it on Tuesday before I was to leave on Wednesday morning, but here it is, Thursday and I'm now in a guest room at the Allenberry Resort Inn and Playhouse in Boiling Springs, Pennsylvania where I'll finish it and post it. This is the location for the annual Veteran Speakers Retreat that I've now hosted for the past 12 years including this year. This is my last year hosting the event as I turn the reins over to members of the dedicated planning committee who have backed me for the past 12 years. But, just like Johnny Carson, of the "Tonight Show" fame, you just know when it's time . . . and it is time.)

One of my favorite TV characters was a beatnik by the name of Maynard G. Krebs. Maynard G. Krebs was the sidekick of one Dobie Gillis, played by Dwayne Hickman on a the TV show titled . . . "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis," aka, just "Dobie Gillis." Krebs was played by Bob Denver who reappeared a number of years later as the first mate on the schooner, S.S. Minnow on another TV show called "Gilligan's Island." But, the

Maynard G. Krebs, the beatnik, was allergic to work. Whenever anyone mentioned the word work, Maynard would shriek the word . . . W-O-R-K! I guess that was my first real exposure to the concept of an anti-work ethic. I, like many Greatest Generation folks (which I just barely qualify for, having been born in 1945 - if I had been born in 1946 I'd be a Baby Boomer) and certainly the majority of Baby Boomers, was raised with a strong work ethic. I began my business life at 12 as an independent paper boy with one of the largest paper routes at my newspaper.

So, after being a lifelong entrepreneur and displaying my work ethic for over 50 years, I, for some reason think back to that time, to that TV show and realize that, maybe, Maynard really had a point. Think about it. How many people do you know who are doing unfulfilling work? How many refer to their jobs as the "salt mine" or the "old grind?" How many refer to their "9 to 5?" How many do you hear talking about "putting in their 40 years" like it's a sentence? (Actually, it may be a life sentence, when you think about it except one makes a bit more than a few cents an hour and doesn't necessarily make stones out of big rocks . . . or do they?)

So, here's the thing. We know there are no real "free lunches." There is a price for everything, right? But, why does work have to be, well . . . W-O-R-K? Sure, since Adam and Eve (you determine how you wish to define this concept), I mean, since animal life forms in whatever shape or species made their debut on this planet, there has been a need to "make a living." In the most primitive form, it means going out on the hunt and "bringing home the bacon," so to speak. That really is the most basic definition of work. Doing what you have to do to survive. It could be as a carnivorous predator fresh meat or as a gatherer seeking the manna that has been provided as part of natures wonderful food chain. But, you had to be proactive to catch and kill your food or find and pick your vegetables and fruit.

This is a point where I could move off in a tangent about Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, but I've discussed that before in this blog, so I'm not going back there. But, ponder this thought from Maslow about the human species, "The story of the human race is the story of men and women selling themselves short." Have humans always sold themselves short and, even more importantly, are humans still selling themselves short?

Maslow also said, "I was awfully curious to find out why I didn't go insane." Is it insanity to continue doing what you've always done, but expect a different outcome? Einstein defined that concept as insanity. But, isn't it some form of insanity to keep doing what you've always done knowing that the outcome will be the same? I hear people say, "the harder I work the behinder I get." Or, "I can't stop doing what I'm doing (working at an unfilling job) or I'll lose all this." My questions is, "All what?" Now, we start entering another realm, the realm of values. But, that's also a tangential topic for another time. But, really, is "all this" worth your life? In the criminal realm his or her crime is the criminal's work. A criminal's work may be stealing, conning, pick-pocketing, shop lifting, even murdering for hire, etc. There is a saying, "Don't do the crime, if you can't do the time." But, the majority of law abiding people don't engage in any crime, yet, they condemn themselves to 40 (or more) years of hard labor. They didn't do any crime, but they still do the time.

Complexity Creates Jobs and W-O-R-K!

Okay! So, going back to the "Adam and Eve time," everything was simpler. No computers, tablets, telephones, cellular phones, television, radio, newspapers, books, supermarkets, giant box stores full of more items than one can even conceive of for purposes that Adam and Eve couldn't have even thought about. You know what I mean. Life, as we know it today, is complex. Even some of the most simple and mundane things have become complicated by laws, regulations, rules and so on. Humans with this wonderful ability to think and reason and use logic have taken life from the simple, basic level to an unbelievable extreme. We have created jobs and W-O-R-K!

As infants we enter this world with unlimited creativity, complete innocence (not knowing the difference between good and evil and being neither) and an unlimited potential to soar. Yet! Only a tiny percentage of the billions of infants who have been born ever exercise much or any of this creativity and potential. Even before many children are old enough to enter the formal educational system they have already been indoctrinated into the world of W-O-R-K! That's how I grew up and, that's how I raised my son. But, please! Do not confuse work with being a productive human being. There is a difference and it may be all the difference in the world.

And, let's also not forget that in our current complex society, we NEED the billions of people around the world who work and jobs I would shriek the word W-O-R-K at, like Maynard. But, we have made the world and everything about it so complex that it can't function without all these jobs and people putting in the 9-5's for 40 years. I do not disrespect anyone who chooses to live this kind of lifestyle. Some of us actually create our own "life sentences" and we don't do 9-5's we do 6 (AM) - to 10 (PM's) and we don't do five days, we do six and seven days.

A Life Sentence To Put Bread On The Table

Yes! It's a complex subject and each of us has an opinion about it. Some of us just accept that this is life - period! Just deal with it. Some of us take Maynard G. Kreb's approach to W-O-R-K. Others fall somewhere on a continuum between the two extremes. It's great if we can get past this when we are young and break out of the 40 year life sentence and create a perspective where we fit work into our life and it's something we enjoy and gain personal and psychic fulfillment from. But, some just seems wrong to me when life is focused around the J.O.B. and we have to fit the rest of this short life we are each given as a miraculous gift in around the J.O.B.

My friend's 90 year old mother, born in the early 20's, grew up during the depression, and filled men's jobs during World War II, recently said to me of her late husband, dead for about 25 years now - he worked 45 years in the paper mill. He hated it! But, he knew he had to do it to put the bread on the table. He lived for about 10 years after he retired from that mill. So, out of 75 years of life, he realized about 10 of them to use as he wanted. But, worse yet is that for 45 years he hated what he had to do five days a week, plus an additional three years where his life was on the line as he fought in the Pacific Theater of World War II. Prior to the war he worked and, of course, as a kid growing up, his freedom and choices were limited and controlled by his parents.

I'm not saying that this was a bad life. I'm simply saying that we are given this precious gift and unlimited potential to do and be anything we want to and go anywhere we want to, but we are indoctrinated by a system that holds us back and takes the majority of our life from us in ways that most not only find unfulfilling (other than putting bread on the table), but dislike intensely or hate. Yet, we accept it as our only option and our lot in life.

This subject requires a lot more thinking on my part. I know what I'm feeling. I know my own experience. I know what I've seen others do with their lives. I'm simply pondering what I may be able to do to influence others to consider alternatives to this system. What do you think?

Photo-of-the-Week #112 - In Its Day, 1960 Red Cadillac Convertible at Desert Gardens Classic Cars, Quartzite, Arizona, April 2010

There she is - big, red and beautiful - a red, 1960 Caddy convertible. Those were the glory days of big cars, big fins and big engines. I found this beauty at a place called Desert Gardens Classic Cars in Quartzite, Arizona. That's one of the great things about simply traveling around this great country with no specific objective but finding whatever serendipity is around the next bend or over the next hill.

Desert Gardens Classic Cars was literally in the desert. I couldn't resist pulling in and ogling all the beauties. There were some cars I hadn't seen since I was a kid growing up in New Jersey. What a treat. If you hadn't noticed it, there is a beautiful Studebaker Commander Skyliner on the top of the car transporter right above the Caddy.

Great old cars, gas guzzlers all, especially compared to today's standards.  

What is Your Reason Why?

Why? Why do you want personal freedom? Why do you want to Live Free? What is your reason Why?

I pose this question simply because this may be the most important time ever to claim your personal freedom and want to live free.

We live in a world of rapid change. The population of the world has increased from two billion to 7 billion in only 84 years. The population of the U.S. has more than doubled from 151 million in 1950 to 313 million in 2012, a mere 62 years. In fact, the population has increased by approximately 335% in the past 100 years.

So, what's the big deal? It's actually quite simple. More people exponentially require more government and more laws and regulations at all levels. The population explosion of the last 100 years has required more resources and depleted those resources faster than all of the past history of the world. More energy, more infrastructure and increased costs of everything are the rule. And with the amazing advances in technology we've seen human labor become less relevant.

On the one hand, there have been many, many advances in the human experience in this country. However, on the other hand, the bigger anything becomes the more difficult it is to find balance. Since the end of World War II and more precisely after 1950 this country continually became more arrogant and over indulgent. This has, again, on one hand, made us the envy of the world and, at the same time, turned the U.S. into the target of massive numbers of the world population, possibly numbering in the billions, who feel that we flaunt our excesses in their faces and interfere in their cultures and lifestyles.

Do I feel it's wrong to enjoy a good life and lifestyle? Absolutely not! But, this goes back to my earlier statement about finding balance. Even within our own borders, divisions are forming between what is becoming a more defined class system. Changes in our economic structure, more government laws and regulations, technological advances, the obsolescence of older, no longer relevant technology and crumbling cities and infrastructure are impacting the society and culture of the U.S. Continuing mass unemployment while not creating enough new jobs to even meet the needs of new people entering the workforce seem to be a trend. Add to this a failing educational system and students beginning their careers carrying massive debt on their shoulders with a bleak outlook for being able to repay the debt.

Then we can add an umbrella over all of this of a government that is probably more dysfunctional than at any other time in the country's history. Scandals are stacking up like pancakes. Government excess and spending is out of control. The government continues to wrack up more debt everyday, still without a plan to generate the revenue to pay down this debt or to cut the fat from government spending to reduce expenditures. The government paper mill continues to grow along with the burgeoning levels of bureaucracy and red tape that fosters fraud and corruption while denying helping those people truly in need in anything remotely resembling a timely manner. This includes returning wounded members of the military, veterans of the current and past wars, truly disabled individuals and seniors who have lost much of their small retirement funds and pensions through the recent Great Recession. Many of these seniors have to take on menial, minimum wage jobs to barely make ends meet, thus denying entry level jobs to young people who are just starting out.

I could go on and on and make this sound gloomier and gloomier, but that's not the point. This isn't speculation. This all exists. The problems and challenges are legion, and while it's easy to point fingers and blame the government or big business or the world economy, that's simply passing the buck. The reality is that we, each of us individually and collectively, are responsible. We elected the current and past governments. We haven't held them to task. We have bought into the excess I mentioned earlier. We've become more and more dependent on the government to be responsible for us. And, of course, while we know there are no free lunches, we still seem to think there is. Everything the government giveth costs money and, typically, it costs the government considerably more to provide all the "free" lunches than if we bought the lunch ourselves.

So, the more the responsibility we allow the government to take over for us, the less freedom we have. Of course, we don't realize that our freedom is being eroded. It happens in small increments. Each new law and regulation has some impact on each of us even though it may be focused on someone, some business or institution three or four parties removed from us. We're losing our freedom little bit by little bit. It's like the often-quoted story of the frog sitting in a pot of water. As the heat is turned up and slowly comes to a boil, the frog is ultimately cooked alive. But, science has proved this to be a myth. The frog will actually jump out of the pot before it boils. We humans, on the other hand, actually stay in the pot until it's too late. We're cooked.

Why?

So, again, I ask Why? If you're reading this blog, you're obviously interested in personal freedom and living free. You want to jump out of the pot of water as you feel it heating up. But, life is so much more complicated than it was in 1950 when there was less than half the population or in 1913 when there was less than one-third the current population in the U.S. We know and accept that everything was much simpler at those earlier times. People were more self-reliant. There were no government safety nets or, at best, very few by the 1950's. Yet, people still lived fulfilling lives.

The vast majority of the population today doesn't remember those days. The Baby Boomer generation was growing up during the last of those days as the transition began to where we are today. While life was tougher for most folks, those folks were also freer and more independent. They maintained closer family ties. There were stronger bonds with friends. Neighbors knew each other and looked out for one another. We know the Great Depression years were extremely difficult, but people were stronger and made it through. There was no unemployment insurance and no Social Security or disability benefits. Medicare and Medicaid hadn't come into existence until the mid '60's. Families, neighbors, churches or other religious organizations provided welfare. But, as tough as it all sounds, people were still freer than they are today with all the entitlement programs, government intervention and other government dictates.

Somewhere inside every human there is a heart beating, wanting to be freer and happier. But, most people today have become conditioned to the government usurping more and more freedom in exchange for the government doing more, providing more, taking over more of our lives and making us less self-reliant. So, we have traded freedom for government mandated and controlled security. That's the price we pay for the government looking out for our "welfare" and providing "social" security. What we're finding out is that the government does a pretty lousy job of providing the security we believe we're "entitled" to, but alas, it's too late. We're in the pot and the water is boiling. We're no longer as self-reliant or free to make our own decisions and choices. We have less control of our own circumstances and lives.

Important Time To Claim Your Personal Freedom

So, is it too late? Are you going to boil in the government's pot of entitlements and security? The answer is yes and no. It is definitely too late for those in our society who have bought into the myth that the government is here to help us and provide us with a secure life. That's not the true function of any government. The government's purpose is to provide protection of our individual rights, provide security of our persons and property and provide defense against invasion and takeover by one or more foreign powers. That's on the simplest level and since I believe in the KISS Principle (Keep It Simple Stupid), I think all governments should be kept as simple as possible. But, all levels of government in our country are anything but simple. Whatever comes after incredibly complicated or complex is still an understatement in describing our system of government.

However, there are some small segments of the population who are not completely buying into the complexity and the welfare and social state our governments have become. Unfortunately, it's impossible to eliminate all aspects of government from our lives. Some Native American Indian nations have their own governments. The Amish communities in Pennsylvania, Ohio and other parts of the U.S. also live in communities they have cultivated and continue to live as they have for centuries with their own social order. There are other small groups who, while living within the United States, basically separate themselves from what we would term as mainstream American society. Typically, these communities live very simple lives, practice thrift and educate their children in their own cultural ways.

There appears to be a growing number of people who are embracing the concept of personal freedom, independent thinking, self-reliance and self-sufficiency. These individuals are from all walks of life and all levels of social strata. Some are skilled artisans and crafts people. Others have advanced education with all types of college degrees. Some are stationary and develop small communities of like-minded individuals, much like a commune.

Still others have reverted back to their nomadic roots. Their homes are typically mobile and their homes are on wheels in a variety of forms. Some work traditional jobs all kinds and their co-workers and employers may not have a clue where and how they live on their off-work hours. Others operate small businesses of all kinds. They may be musicians, photographers, artists, writers, crafters, consultants and mystery shoppers to mention only a few. Some may have Ebay, Amazon and Craig's List businesses. Still others may pick up seasonal work or work camping jobs with campgrounds, state and national parks, companies like Amazon and others.

Usually, they find some way of generating revenue that requires minimal time, is something they thoroughly enjoy doing and returns enough income to support their lifestyle as they are living free and getting to do all the things they enjoy doing. In other words, they are not working to support a mortgage company or landlord, vehicle finance company or anyone else. They are working to provide themselves with enough money to allow them the most time to enjoy doing all the things life offers.

These freedom loving people are men and women and range from young adults to seniors in their retirement years. They are not impressed by status, but by creativity and ingenuity. They are generous with their time, knowledge and experience in helping others who have chosen this lifestyle to get started or to make improvements. They, of course, comply with the laws of the land. They are not derelicts or street people who beg or harass mainstream society. To the contrary, they prefer to avoid most involvement with the mainstream. They do not want to hassle anyone nor be hassled by anyone, especially the police and other government authorities that would like them to stay within the nice little boxes the mainstream population are conditioned to and conform to.

Now, here's the thing. When the going gets tough for those in mainstream society, it usually doesn't impact these folks who have chosen to live free. They have learned how to depend as little as possible on the government and the authorities. If there are benefits they have earned during their lifetime, they expect to receive those benefits since they invested time or money or both in those benefits. But, they are not looking for handouts. They are self-sufficient. They don't need a microwave to eat healthy food. They don't need a modern bathroom to keep clean and practice good personal hygiene. They are not concerned if there are massive layoffs in global, Fortune 1000 companies, because they know how to be flexible and create products and services to generate the income they require. They are typically debt free, so they are not concerned about having their home or vehicles foreclosed on or repossessed. They are frugal and thrifty and know how to clothe and supply their needs on-line or at thrift stores, flea markets, Goodwill and the Salvation Army.

Some earn very substantial incomes from their various enterprises. They learn how to live well with only what they need, splurging when the right opportunity comes along. The rest they set aside for the proverbial rainy day or unfortunate circumstance that might require them to take some time off. There is something to achieving this level of personal freedom that provides peace of mind and fulfillment, knowing that you are in control of your own life or at least as much as anyone can be in this very complicated world we live in.

The key question is do you want to continue living in the mainstream world with all the complexities, demands, controls, restrictions, rules and so on? Do you want to be controlled by a job, a traditional business, the moneylenders, the government and the neighbors who believe you should conform to the rest of the neighborhood? Do you want to live with the constant stress of realizing that any number of outside forces could drastically alter your lifestyle in a moment?

This is why now is the right time to claim your personal freedom and begin living free. There are only two main things you have to decide to begin your quest for personal freedom and living free. You must define what living free means to you and what changes you are willing to make to embrace this new lifestyle. Few people ever return to the stress of their old lifestyle once they have tasted personal freedom, happiness and fulfillment. 

Living With Less. A Lot Less.

Well, it's official. According to an article in Forbes, an international institute that has been studying societal changes for years ranks the U.S. as the 12th happiest country in the world in 2012. As a comparison, the U.S. ranked #10 in 2011. So, we're sliding down the slippery slope of unhappiness, disillusionment, unfulfilled expectations and discontent. As a society we are less happy than other countries.

Okay, so here we are, the wealthiest country in the world and by evaluating 89 categories of life, despite the wealth, despite all the "stuff" we have, despite McMansions, etc. there are 11 other countries happier than us. Hmm! Do you suppose there really is something to the saying that "money can't buy happiness?"

Now believe me, even though I have been "preaching" that we have become an over indulgent, materialistic, consumerism society and it's costing us our personal freedom and our happiness, I was truly hoping that there were some happy people enjoying living high on the hog. I suppose if you look hard you'll find some. In his Op-Ed in the Sunday, March 10, 2013 New York Times, Graham Hill, who literally had it all, found that having it all didn't deliver the freedom and happiness he was hoping to enjoy. I invite you to read his NY Times Op-Ed "Living With Less. A Lot Less." But, do yourself a favor. Read as many of the comments as possible. They are very interesting. Some people totally get it. Some people don't have a clue. Some people believe he can choose to live this lifestyle because he's been obscenely wealthy since before he was 30 from an Internet start-up company he sold.

You can make up your own mind. The fact is that the U.S. is the 12th happiest country in the world and declining in the rankings despite the other fact that we're the wealthiest country in the world. Less is more. I know where I stand. You know where I stand.

Ask yourself the questions - are you happier today than you were, perhaps, as a kid growing up in the 50's, 60's or even the 70's? Do you feel more personally free or less? Do you have more time to do the things you want to do (including spending time with the family if you have one) or less? Is your stress level and the number of things that cause you stress less or more today? Yes! You can lie to yourself. You can lie to everyone else. But, deep inside the true answers are eating away at you.

It's your life. Live it any way you choose to. But, just remember . . . there are no do-overs.  

Opportunities

So, it's March 2013. This is an important month for me. Later this month I'll have another birthday at which time I'll commence the 69th journey of 365 days. I never gave much thought about attaining the age of 68, but here I am. Wow! My mind keeps thinking it's still back in it's 20's and 30's, but alas, the body reminds the mind that it's not quite the way it all works.

50th Anniversary

This year, my 68th going into my 69th, also is the 50th anniversary of three extremely important events in my life.

Fifty years ago this year I attended my high school commencement as I completed my 12th year of education.

Fifty years ago this year, after working my behind off at a kosher delicatessen for my summer job, often working 80 hours in a week (and leaving me little time to conduct my own small business enterprise), I commenced with my first year of higher education. I learned some of the most profound, practical and valuable knowledge in my first hour in a college classroom, thanks to Mr. Reaske, my first college English professor.

And, 50 years ago this year I met Mr. Ted Sheft and Ms. Emma Fantone, the directors of the Audio-Visual Center at Montclair State College, where they had granted me a work scholarship. It was there under the mentoring of Ted Sheft that I discovered what would end up being my lifetime career, the recording industry, along with numerous tangential opportunities.

It's hard to believe that it's been 50 years since those pivotal moments and the opportunities they opened to me. But, please, don't think that was the end of the uncountable opportunities that have crossed my life journey. I said they were uncountable because there is no way for me to even recall them all. I've even begun to forget many of the opportunities I took advantage of and gained some kind of knowledge and experience from. Some it is was negative, but most was positive and it all became part of the sum total of who I am today. I've become a very different person, in so many ways, since that year 50 years ago.

Most of us graduate (complete some course of study or training) and go through some form of commencement (new beginning or the start of something new) ceremony. Combining that which we have learned in order to graduate and then commencing with this new start or journey brings us to the opportunities.

Never Ending Stream Of Opportunities

I have been blessed with a never-ending stream of opportunities. Many of them changed my life. Many of them took me in directions I had never thought about or contemplated. Many of them ended in a failure of one sort of another. Many have provided me with the interesting and exciting life that I've lived so far. But, the best part is that I still haven't seen any end to the ongoing stream of opportunities.

Actually, many years ago I realized there was no way I could ever take advantage of all the opportunities that were constantly coming my way, so I started passing them to other people who I felt could benefit from them. Some of those people found great success in the opportunities I passed on. Many didn't do all that well, but they, hopefully, learned something from the opportunities and the experience. And, of course, many of them didn't even recognize the opportunities as such and did nothing. This is their loss, in this case, of course.

What's All The Whining About?

Here's what bothers me a lot as I'm turning over this 68th year milestone in my life. There are more opportunities than there ever have been in history, yet, I hear so much whining and excuses from every segment of the human spectrum from the young to the old, from the unskilled to the highly skilled, from the uneducated to the over-educated. It seems like they must be teaching courses in both high school and institutions of higher education on whining and making excuses.

Young people complain they can't find jobs. Okay, so create your own job. When I was a youngster the big challenges were too much competition (just like the excuses we hear today). But, we learned to go out and shovel snow in the winter and mow lawns in the summer. We could mulch gardens for people. We washed cars. It didn't take a lot of ingenuity to find ways to earn some money. Some of those small, simple, part-time "businesses" took root and those youngsters grew them into full-time businesses that provided a lifestyle for them and their families.

Today, you can't find a youngster with a shovel or a lawnmower or a pail and sponge if your life depended on it. They are too busy sitting on their butts, watching crappy TV shows or playing video games or friending people on Facebook. They expect their parents (who also aren't too much further down this road than their kids) to provide everything including a car when they reach the age where they can drive. And while they're doing nothing and missing all the opportunities, they are also getting fatter and fatter. And, unfortunately, this goes for both the male and the female of the species.

Opportunity In Complication, Stress And Time Demands

Today's world is more complicated and stressful and time demanding than at any time in the history of human kind. We're even reaching and destroying some of the peace and less stressful societies in the rapidly disappearing aboriginal parts of the world. But, along with all of this complication and stress and demand on time, comes all kinds of opportunities. Let's face it and be really honest with ourselves, if we've been around for the past 30 or so years in the industrialized world, we know it's nothing like it was growing up in the 40's, 50's and 60's. More and more families are minimally two career families (husband/father and wife/mother) both working and they need to both work to make ends meet. But, just in this one area alone, family services, someone ambitious and creative can make life better for these families while making their own lives better.

Another fact, if you've been downsized during the last five or six years, you can pretty much count on the chances of getting rehired in the same thing you were doing at an equal or better income are far less likely than you want to believe. Once a business or any organization sheds excess baggage, they find ways to get the work done far more cost effectively and efficiently by retraining the remaining labor force and implementing the continually evolving technology that replaces human labor.

If you're 45 or especially 50 or older, you can pretty much kiss those higher paying jobs in your chosen career field goodbye. It's so much more cost effective to hire young people who are anxious to get their lives started and will do it for far less money than you will with your big mortgage and multiple car payments and other costs of your position in life. It's not fair. But, life is not, never has been and never will be fair. Remember the law of he jungle - survival of the fittest? Well, guess what, we live in a modern jungle.

Old Ideas Brought Up To Date

When I was a kid we had a man who had a small business picking up and dropping off dry cleaning. We had milk delivered to our house. We had another small business that brought butter, eggs and all kinds of cheeses and other dairy products to our home. We had a green grocer who brought fresh produce. And then there was the bake goods truck that came by and provided those goods. And even for us kids there was the Good Humor man and usually one or two other independent ice cream trucks who came through the neighborhood each day during the warmer weather. Of all of those, only the "ice cream man" still exists.

There have been some attempts, several with some success, in delivering meals to one's home. Of course, the most notable success at that is Domino's Pizza. But, there are others. And I've seen instances where an individual will make arrangements with several restaurants offering different cuisines. The individual then solicits customers for his restaurant delivery service, provides the menus, creates a computerized order form and allows the customers to call in, email the order or order on-line. With the new credit card merchant services offered by Square-up and Intuit, all you need is a smart phone to charge the order.

Dog walking services are another growing business. One woman who was making a pretty handsome living in information technology on Long Island was downsized and couldn't find any new jobs at all and certainly nothing paying what she had been earning. She lived in an upscale/wealthy section of Long Island where she started a business cleaning up dog poop from the yards of those affluent folks who didn't want to do their own "dirty work." She ended up with so much business that she hired several more out of work women and while they made a nice living, she replaced her own salary plus some. I actually knew a woman about ten years ago who had a business in the Hamptons serving all those wealthy New Yorkers who had summer mansions there. She took care of all their "indoor" plants both when the people were there during the summer and during the off-season when they were back in New York City. She lived quite comfortably, I might add. Personal services of all kinds are hot opportunities.

Currently Baby Boomers are turning 60 at the rate of one every 7 seconds and they comprise about 30% of the American population. They are the largest population group in the U.S. As each year progresses, these Baby Boomers, because they will live longer and longer, will require all kinds of special services from home care, shopping, transportation, etc.

I've really only scratched the surface of the unlimited number of opportunities that continue to expand exponentially. There is absolutely no reason for whining or making excuses. Every one of us can choose to think and live as free as we want to if we'll just use some of the God given intelligence and creativity we were born with. Okay, so maybe you're not going to end up doing your first choice dream as a way to put food on the table. But, here's the thing, IF you are a living free, thinking free individual and determine what you REALLY want and need to live a free and happy life, with or without a family, you WILL find an opportunity (actually, many opportunities) that will fill all your living free requirements. Best of all, you can put it together in such a way as to make it a family endeavor, thus, enjoying time together, working as a team and teaching your offspring a positive work ethic and to be creative in their own future endeavors.

So, what are you waiting for? It won't be handed to you on a platter. You already have what you need.