Tuesday, July 6, 2010

A friendly burro

How's this for a friendly burro? I took the picture along U.S. 395 south of Bishop, California. The burros come right up to the barbed wire fence along the highway, hoping a tourist will stop to feed them an apple. I was in a motorhome and did, in fact, have an apple, which made this burro very happy.

I know we are not supposed to feed wild animals, but burros aren't really wild. They were abandoned in the desert by early miners, after which they had a grand time reproducing. In Oatman, Arizona, a small tourist town on old Route 66, shopkeepers sell bags of carrots for $1, which you can then feed to the burros that wander the town. But you can't feed the carrots to baby burros because for some reason (I can't remember) that can kill them.

Are you living your dream?

I met a woman the other day, early 70s, I think, who told me that she and her husband had planned to be traveling these days. They worked hard their whole lives, saved money, and dreamed of when they would be free to travel. Then, about the time they were counting down to their freedom, her husband developed a rare disease that took away his eyesight. End of dream.

How about your dream? Are you living it or waiting for some "perfect" time when circumstances are just right? Years ago, when I was in my late 30s, I left a comfy life to follow my own dream. I sold everything and bought a tiny motorhome to become a wandering travel writer. Invigorated, but often questioning my sanity, I hit the road. For much of the next ten years, I drove 150,000 miles of America, writing and publishing my "on the road" newspaper Out West. Not a month passed that I didn't receive at least one letter from a reader who said, "Chuck, I admire you for following your dream. I had a dream, too, but then I got sick (or my wife got sick) and now it can never happen."

In my case, those ten years were incredibly rewarding -- ah. . . the people, the places. . . the adventure! Alas. . . that decade also left me broke. Still, it was worth every penny I didn't have.

If, in your heart, you have a dream for your life, then march toward it beginning today. Don't wait! No excuses! Time has a way of swiftly slipping by, and it has no preference whether we live a life of dreaming or live the life we dream.

"To live only for some future goal is shallow. It's the sides of the mountain that sustain life, not the top." -- Robert M. Pirsig

"How often is happiness destroyed by preparation, foolish preparation!" -- Jane Austen


"Today's egg is better than tomorrow's hen." -- Turkish proverb