Golden Dreams
By
Dave Treasure
Copyright 2013 Dave Treasure
********
Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
********
********
When I was a young boy, I dreamed of high adventure, excitement, and a life filled with wondrous things. Growing older I would dream about possibly being admired as a celebrity for acting, painting, writing, or some other high profile career.
Now I am no longer a young boy, or a young man, and I ponder the things I used to dream of. I wonder where the time went, how did I allowed myself to let all these dreams slip away without giving any of them a fighting chance to bloom into reality for me.
My answer is simple when I think about it; I lived my life as I felt other people would want me to do it. I did the things I thought would bring my dreams to me, instead of pursuing my dreams and then worrying about how others would perceive my actions.
I don’t mean to say other people should not matter, or I should have been selfish in my pursuits, but what went wrong? Did I not remain true to myself? Why did I not succeed in realizing my dreams and wishes?
Thinking further I realize I have things in my life that I would not change even if the dreams I thought were all I wanted were offered to me today. I have had blessings and disappointments, happiness, and despair, I’ve made mistakes, and I’ve made good choices. After everything has been taken into account I think the dreams of my youth were not the dreams I really wanted to achieve but just flights of fancy and the ideals of youthful exuberance. Along the road of life other dreams took shape and I was able to accomplish several of my most desired dreams all along without realizing it.
From time to time thoughts of those earlier dreams would creep into my mind as I was driving to or from work, or just drifting off on a little daydreaming trip during some idle time in my day. Sometimes it would seem like it would take little or no effort to put those thoughts into action, and pursue one or more of the unrealized dreams of my youth, an adventure of a lifetime, a plan that comes together, a satisfying feeling of true accomplishment. Then the reality of my life and my commitments would stop me in my tracks, and the defeatist in me would take over “you can’t do this or that because of these things or those” then I would just forget about it and get on with my day. After all, those things are for young men, and I left that bridge in my rear view mirror a few miles ago.
At times I would talk to my wife, my friends, or people at work about my thoughts on unfulfilled dreams, and how I was too far “past my prime” to even think about it anymore. Most of the time the common response was empathy, and a change in subject, but once in a while someone would assure me “your only as old as you feel”, and besides weren’t there 70, and 80 year old people running marathons, and stuff? Those people decided they were not “too old” so why not me? Am I some kind of quitter? My answer is no absolutely, I am not a quitter. Follow through was one of the things I prided myself on, but dreams are different, I follow through on tangible things, things that I can measure, like driving for results, the finished product, not make believe.
After chewing on these thoughts for a while it hit me, make believe is only make believe until you do something about it to turn it into reality. I spent my life talking myself into believing that my dreams were out of reach and silly, so there was no reason to try and accomplish them.
I seemed to become obsessed with these thoughts and ideas, possibly trying to convince myself to buck up and go for it. All I know is I couldn’t get the idea of accomplishing a long held dream out of my mind.
Flash forward a few months, and here I am on an adventure, following those youthful dreams, making reality out of make believe, making a plan come together, gaining that satisfying feeling of true accomplishment, or so I thought. It’s kind of humorous when you think about it, following a “dream” and not realizing until it’s too late your dream came attached to a nightmare. Well, I’m getting a little ahead of myself, let me back up and start from the beginning.
Several weeks ago I was comfortably sitting in my lazy boy chair watching the T.V. with my wife when I started whining once again about not accomplishing dreams, and how I let them go throughout my life, and I guess it was just too much for her to listen to yet again. “Well you know dear”, she said. “Sitting here complaining isn’t going to make those dreams happen, only you can do that, Why don’t you take some vacation time and go do something you’ve always wanted to do?” I guess deep down that’s what I really wanted to hear, because that was all it took for me to start really thinking about how to go about planning for, and deciding what would need to be done to follow one of my long held dreams. There was much to be done, I would need to decide what to do, where to go to do it, and what I would need to make it really happen. I had some work to do.
First problem, what dream should I pursue? I’ve always thought it would be great to look for gold in the desert, that seemed like something my age wouldn’t become too much of a factor in, after all how hard could it be? I have looked at this stuff on the internet, and by all accounts gold is just lying around waiting to be found! The only physical activity is to be able to walk, and I could do that. Yeah, this will be great! Let the planning begin! I’m really going to do it this time, no more sitting around, just do it! I let my wife know about the dream I settled on, and asked her to join me, but she decided that walking around in the desert was not even close to anything she had ever wanted to do so she respectfully declined my offer. I was on my own with this one.
Now that I settled on a dream, getting time off work at the best time of the year to be walking around in the desert was next. Mid summer is probably not the best time I reasoned, so I took some time off in the early fall, no problem there. Next, pick a location, Arizona has plenty of areas to search for gold so I researched that a bit and decided to try the northwest section of the state. Kingman Arizona seemed like a good place for the “home base” of my adventure; there are plenty of remote areas to look for gold, plus hotels, restaurants, gas stations, and all the comforts of home at the end of the day. I booked my hotel room in Kingman, and got a few maps of the area off the internet. Three items down, I was almost feeling it now! I already drive a 4x4 truck so transportation was no problem; things were just falling into place like they were always supposed to be, it was getting hard to contain my enthusiasm.
Packing for the trip and getting a list of supplies together was relatively easy, Sunscreen and water were tops on my list, energy bars, hard candies, first aid kit, and bug repellant. I wasn’t completely sure of the weather so, shorts, jeans, boots, t-shirts, a couple different types of hat, and a light jacket. Anything else I might need I could pick up along the way. I packed a suitcase for the hotel, and brought a small supply backpack for each day trip. I changed the oil in my truck, and greased the front end, put my toolkit in the back, brought extra belts, bulbs, hoses, and fuses; there was a battery operated compressor for tire inflation, and a tire repair kit. For self defense my 9 millimeter pistol with shoulder holster, and a knife. I was definitely ready, in my mind at least. I was as exited as a little kid the night before Christmas! I spent my free time mapping my trip to Kingman, I would take two days to get there, and I booked a room for the first night at a little beyond the halfway mark. Time was allowed for a side trip to the Grand Canyon, a stop for lunch, and then it would be on to Kingman, and straight to the gold!
After what seemed like an agonizingly long few weeks, the big day finally arrived, I kissed my wife goodbye, jumped into my truck put in a Bob Seger CD clicked on my seatbelt, slapped on my sunglasses, and pulled out of the driveway with “Roll Me Away” playing on the stereo; I was finally on my way! “Lo
ok out gold I’m a comin’ for ya!”
For the first hundred miles of my trip other people on the highway must have thought something was wrong with me, because I couldn’t stop grinning like an idiot. Finally the thrill started to wear off and I settled into the monotonous task of keeping it between the lines. Mile after mile I daydreamed about finding the mother lode, even though I knew it was pretty far fetched, but it passed the time, and it was fun to think about. I reached my first nights destination earlier than expected, and grabbed some dinner at a local diner. After getting checked into my room and calling home to let my wife know all was good, I