What's your dream?

[Melalvai]

I have various goals, like 2nd century, overnight bike trip, bike to my folks' (>200 miles), and survive the winter.

But my dream is this:
I'm a grandma sitting in a rocking chair telling stories about my cycling adventures. The words "In my day," come out pretty often, even though some of the stories are from last week. I'm wearing my combat boots. Suddenly I hop up, grab my bike, and pedal away! My grandkids huff & puff to keep up.

It's up to my daughter to provide the grandkids. In the meantime, I'm working on the stories. Some of them are sligtly exaggerated!

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

Great thread.
Like you, my dream is to be old and riding. My dream is for my husband and I to both be riding into our early 80's together somehow. :o

[Mr. Bloom]

10 years ago, Silver and I were hiking in the Smokey Mountains. We came across an elderly couple...probably in their 80's...on a very difficult trail. He had a cane in one hand and his wife's hand in the other...and they were hiking that trail together.

We set a dream then of "being that couple".

[Zen]

If I'm poor as dirt I'll still be quite happy in life to be known as "that old lady who rides her bike".

But my dream is another story. That one involves building contractors.

[LBTC]

That's my dream, too! The two of us riding our bikes more and more the older we get!! :D There won't be our grandkids to tell stories to, but there will be friends' grandkids to spellbind! heehee

Of course my goal is for the homeopathic treatments to work so I can actually *ride* my bike this year.

Hugs and butterflies,
~T~

[teigyr]

A long time ago when I first started riding, I was training in Southern California. I was on a bike trail headed from the beach and had road tires on my mtn bike. I was training for my first century and was doing a lot of miles at the time.

As I was lamenting to myself about the heat and the wind, I hear knobby tires behind me. This man starts to pass but then hangs back to talk. I explained I was training for my first century. This man, who could easily pass me on knobby tires, explained that it was his 70th birthday. He was going to ride 70 miles then go home and drink champagne with his wife.

I always thought that would be what I would want. Of course, DH is welcome to ride with me ;)

[dellafalls]

My dream is to live car free, grow my own food, ride around on my bike as I age with a dog in the basket and a few running behind like some ecentric old lady. My kids say I don't have far to go!!!

[madscot13]

Great! I love to hear doable dreams!

[iFKA]

My dream is to have three kids and to go with them every Sunday on a bike trip. We already have one small road bike and we haven't even got married... :p

And when I get really old I'd like to be fat grandma that likes to cook and that bakes cake every day to her numerous grandchildren and has enough energy to play with all of them. I imagine to still drive a bike but the one with basket and bell and I do it slowly so I could stop near every neighbor and talk about my previous adventures.

[IFjane]

Dream for now: To have a mother (she is 84 and healthy as a horse) who acknowledges that I am an adult and am entitled to dreams and goals of my own. To have a mother who supports my goals and dreams and maybe, just maybe, says to me that she is proud of the work I do for the less fortunate families in this world. Ok....I needed to dump that and figured this was as good a place as any. Can you tell I have issues? :(

Dream for the future: Like many of you, to be OLD and still hiking and riding my bike. With SO. :)

[madscot13]

Maybe mine is just to have a significant other!

[limewave]

To find happiness wherever life lands me. And to never be stagnant. Have my own design/marketing agency. Be that lady that wins the over 80 age group xterra world championship in Hawaii. Still being madly in love with my husband at our 50-year anniversary.

[DDH]

I have a short right now dream, that someday in the near future I will have taken off 100 lbs and look fit and trim and athletic on my bike as I ride down the road with lots of power in my legs and not getting so fatigued.

Long term in the future dream would be to stay healthy enough to continue to ride into my older years along with my DH. When we retire we want to take the travel trailor out across America, and the bikes go with us.

[mimitabby]

It's funny; we dream about being grandparents too; but we're not holding our breath. I also dream that I will be able to ride my bike into my 80's and get it together enough so that I spend a good part of my time being creative.

[rij73]

My dream is to stay happily married to DH to a ripe old age and to be able to play the piano just as long...

[northstar]

My big cycling dream would be to ride across the US. Eventually!

My dream for this summer is to bike to my parent's house. That's 100 miles away. With a stop midway at my brother's place. Hmmm...I need to get out the map and start plotting...

[Crankin]

I guess my dream is to stay healthy enough to ride into my 80s and that my husband stays alive long enough to do that with me!
Short term, maybe to be able to do SOME mechanical stuff and do more interesting multi day riding/tours, get a Bike Friday touring bike, and perhaps ride just a little bit faster.

[Torrilin]

Short term dream: to be able to ride up real hills again. Not those gentle little grades, but a grade that's steep enough to be a challenge.

Long term dream: To be as active at 60 as my dad, and to keep a marriage going as long as mom and dad have. They're still happy together after almost 37 years :).

[kjay]

My dream is to continue to take adventure trips every year as long as I am able and to be able for a long time. This year I rode a camel in the Sinai desert with the Bedouin, next year it's mountain biking and camel riding in the Gobi desert in Mongolia, maybe also biking and camel riding in the Thar desert. . . I'm in my 60s and loving life to the limit. Thanks for this very interesting thread. I enjoy reading about everyone's dreams.

[short cut sally]

My long term dream would be to gather enough strength to do a camping trip with panniers and backpacks on a bike for days at a time. My DH might bike a few miles here and there but not as compelled as I am to bike. And while I am dreaming, the weather would be perfect with a few sprinkles here and there, mid 70's and no to little breeze! Short term dream would be to spend some time at Martha's VIneyard and cycle. Heard it is beautiful.

[spokewench]

My dreams are really pretty simple. I want to continue to be healthy for as long as I am alive, alert, physically and mentally capable. That may include cycling, or other activities, but to remain flexible and to make the right choices when life's little changes throw a kink in the mix. I vow to be flexible and to keep growing and learning as I grow old and to remain part of my community and not isolate myself from others. I think this is the key to growing old gracefully and healthfully.

Things do change when you get older don't they? I can remember as a youngster wanting to be a professional jockey, a veterinarian, and/or an olympian!

[Crankin]

Shellyj, hold your cycling dream for the Vineyard until fall or next spring. Riding there in the summer really sucks, unless you want to stay on a bike path, with stops and driveways every few feet. We went there 3 summers ago and got yelled at, pushed off the road and generally aggravated on the day we did a 66 mile ride. It seems like tourists there have no clue how to deal with cyclists. Plus, quite a few people rudely stared and made comments about my husband's cycling attire when we had lunch in Edgartown.
It IS great to ride there in the off season and will go back to do that.

[RoadRaven]

My big cycling dream would be to ride across the US. Eventually!


Bike, Forest! Bike!!!
:p

[cosc]

Rij73 and NorthStar stole my dreams. I would like to also be able to play the piano into older age and ride my bike across the US with my hubby.

[MomOnBike]

I'm still talking about a Vancouver to Key West bike trip.

I want to be the Aunt/Grandma that cooks up a super-hot batch of green chili with tortillas while teaching (by example) the youngsters how to cuss in multiple languages,the words to naughty songs and how to hunt elk.

And then I want to hop on my bike and come back weeks later with more stories and pictures.

And when I die, as we all will, I want it to be sudden, while doing something I love.

In short, I want to be the eccentric old lady that everyone has to make allowances for - and yes, I've been told that I'm almost there, already. :D

[short cut sally]

Thanks Robin for the advice as I had no idea, thought it would be very bike friendly..will definetly plan around that...end of hijack over.

[equus123]

my dreams?

1) stay with the person i love
2) make a living riding my bike

[smilingcat]

My dream hasn't changed from the time I was a teenager.

I still vividly remember an ad from the Ad Council on pollution. An elderly Indian chief crying in the foreground with video clips after video clips in the background of pollution, smoke billowing out the top of smoke stack, large pipes hanging over a river and discharging industrial waste into our river...the brown haze hanging in our air...

I still want to make our society green. I want a cleaner environment for the next generation than what I am living now.

And I want to live a life in a pastoral setting, a slower pace and in harmony with the environment. I really don't need much to make me happy. I see virtue in simple living.

...What the world needs now
is love peace now...

This is my dream,
Smilingcat

oh and stay healthy enough to ride my bicycle.

[li10up]

My dream is to be able to quit work in my 40s and still be able to afford health insurance to cover any mishaps I might have while cycling and backpacking all over the US. It would be perfect if DH was with me but since he likes neither he'll have to follow me around in a motorhome and be my support team. :D

[RoadRaven]

Like you, li, I want to retire in 6-7 years (I'll be late 40's) when my youngest son finishes school, and spend more time with my partner... I have a great job, but it keeps me from him, and I hate that.

We are going to go to various bike comps round the country, maybe follow some tours overseas, we gonna grow old together...

We want to save enough money so we can live off the interest and don't have to rely on anyone else... just ourselves, and our bikes...

And the final part of my dream? That all five of my children find a partner as loyal and as true and as devoted as I have found... and that they love, like and adore their partner as I do mine.

[five one]

It's a given that I hope to be riding bikes with DH for many years to come. He is a lymphoma survivor coming up on 16 years of remission after having had a bone marrow transplant in 1991. He was a cyclist before cancer and used his bike to regain his fitness three times during his years of illness. Four, actually, because he had a total knee replacement in 2004, also cancer related. Without good health, future dreams are much harder to achieve. It would be fun to do a multiday B&B-type bike tour every year for as long as we can.

I would retire tomorrow if it were financially feasible, but realistically I see myself here counting beans for another ten years :( . After that, I think I would like to go back to college and take some classes that I didn't have time for (or interest in) when I was in school back in the early 70s. I may try my hand at a little cottage industry making my famous (with family, friends, coworkers, and several SSs anyway :p ) gingerbread cookies.

I would love to buy a piece of property in Colorado, and design and build our dream home. Solar, energy efficient, as green as possible. That's where the college classes come in. It would be a place where we would live out our days comfortably and in beautiful surroundings.

I found the following in the Tuesday San Jose Mercury News. I hope I will be like Etta, but cycling rather than running, when I'm 80.

good advice from Etta (www.mercurynews.com/losgatos/ci_6178683)

[emily_in_nc]

To retire in a few years (I'm 46 now) and split my time between living in the mountains in a neat little cabin (hiking, kayaking, riding, camping, etc.) and cruising to points south (Florida Keys, Bahamas, Carribbean) on a sailboat the other half of the year (when it's cold in the mountains). All with my DH of 22 years, of course!

We are taking one step at a time towards that dream. Took the sailing lessons over the past few years, have already started a boat search, and just bought a small piece of property in the NC mountains to build our little cabin. :) We are very blessed in so many ways....

Emily

[Melalvai]

I've really enjoyed reading everyone's dreams. Thanks for all the great replies. :)

[solobiker]

One of my dreams is to bike across the country. I don't think DH would be up for that so I would have to find someone to do it with. I would also like to through hike the contential divide trail. It would also be nice to retire early but I am not sure if that would ever be a possibility. May all of your dreams come true.