To be able to do my work without begging the government for money every couple of years.

Working for myself, owning my own business.

Walking the Appalachian trail.

Traveling the world.

Buying myself a Winnebago, climbing into it, driving away and never looking back.

Staving off the inevitable apocalypse until I'm safely cremated.

Sleeping on a pile of money with many beautiful women?

Nah. How about: somehow making money off my photography or writing?

On a more realistic note, traveling into space.

cleaning my house.
maybe tidying my garden.

A man can dream.

Being able to keep (and rent out) our current house as well as building a new place on the block of land we bought this weekend. We want more space, but it seems such a shame to sell our first home that we put so much work into creating.

Why, yes, I am greedy. Thanks for asking.

at this point they're mostly sexual, sorry. in my twenties I still had fantasies about being discovered by a Serie A scout while playing soccer in the park with friends, and becoming a defender for my favorite team, Internazionale FC. Or, funnily enough, for Arsenal (London is just so cool and I like Arsenal).

but now I'm too old, nobody plays his first professional soccer game at 35, so it's mostly sexual fantasies. I guess I'm on my way to become a dirty old man in about 20 years' time. maybe I'll get fat and will stop having fantasies about sex, and I'll dream about food, who knows.

oh, and sometimes I have fantasies about moving to the San Fernando Valley and act in porn films. but then my mom would just die of shame, so I'd better avoid that.

unless I'm by now too old for porn, too -- but that is quite unlikely I guess.

The only way your mother would be ashamed is if she found out and she would need to watch them to do that, surely? Because mothers don't watch things like porn, you should be pretty safe.

Being happy at least most of the time. No longer sure if it is possible though.

not having to work ever, and traveling all over, and living in Europe, and never having to worry about spending money on anything, and not having to deal with assholes, and that only good people got power, and ...

Mothers don't watch things like porn? Ha!

Another one for me: designing and building my own house. Think hobbit-like organic architecture that looks like it grew out of the ground. Think bed alcoves and a sun-drenched breakfast nook. Think hot tub jungle room. Think the porch of the gods. Think vegetable garden with lots of flowers for the butterflies.

No, mothers don't watch porn - everyone knows that. Just like your parents don't have sex. Don't try to tell me otherwise, because I'm not listening.

We are just about to start designing our own house, which will be not at all hobbit-like, but which may include some other aspects of your dream. Designing my own home was something of a childhood dream of mine (I wanted to be an architect when I was young), so I may yet get to have one of my dreams come true before I die.

Hey dg, that's great! If you need an architectural designer's assistance, just lemme know... I'll live vicariously.

for real if we are talking sexual fantasties... let me count the ways. I know mr. gaspode isn't down with a m/m/f threesome, and that will remain one of my greatest regrets. Heh.

the usual: the respect of men, the lust and admiration of women. I'm working on it. I'll get back to you.

you don't value the respect of women, jonmc?

(sorry I had to bite)

I value the respect of women, but I value their lust even more. Call me crazy. The lust of men is a devalued currency on my exchange, sorry.

What's the exchange rate?

Takes back his *heart*

SCUBA instructor in Malaysia during the summer; snowboard instructor in B.C. during the winter.

Being jonmc.

Oh, and to get a shoutout at some point. But not just because I made this comment; I want it to come from the heart (somewhere sub-cocklelar). A real shout-out.

gaspode - this is exactly what cloning was invented for. Send a dirty sheet to a cooperative lab, wait 21 years...viola!

I want Specklet's hobbit house.

Actually, what I really want is a satisfying career and a happy relationship. The rest is details.

Winning lottery ticket. I can spend hours thinking about what I'm going to do with the millions. The most current is pull my son out of school, buy a yacht, buy my house, get a house/dog sitter and take off around the world in the yacht with my kids and a whole bunch of my friends.

There is no lottery in North Carolina, alas, but I don't let that stop the fantasizing. I did win $40 in Maryland once.

Heh. I only buy lottery tickets when I have a bad day.
Today I bought two.

Most of the things that I fantasize about now are beyond the realm of the possible. I wish I could travel across vast spanses of time and space. Or that I had a machine that could instantly transport people to different places. That I could have dinner with my dad.

Those are the things that would truly blow my mind.

Living as a gentleman of leisure, a flâneur without obligations, in a Roman palazzo with a beautiful kitchen & library. Of course, there’d have to be a lottery win or suchlike impossible windfall first, in order to fund this lifestyle.

To travel and live overseas temporarily and to have a little house in the countryside decked out with books, artwork and collectibles from around the world. I don't like living in clutter but must have adopted the clutter gene from somewhere??? the rest is a secret : )

two words: Frisbee Girl

Fantasies, huh?

I awaken, my cheek pressed against her shoulder, my nose along the back of her neck, and she still smells of roses. Her hair curtains the morning light from me and tickles my eyes.

When I blink and smile my face pulls away from her back and she rolls away a bit, her breath still heavy and slow with undisturbed sleep. I start to pursue, then just stop and look at her, twined in sheets, her right hand blessing the pillow, her left reaching out to the window.

Months after we met, our friendship turned on a rained-out tennis game and an extra bottle of wine; her hand blessed my face then, and I held it there and said, "Don't stop," and she didn't.

Now she's thousands of miles away, and I don't know when I'll see her again.

She turns in her sleep, faces me, and draws her left arm down from the pillow and against my chest. I look at her for a moment, smell her, feel her, hold her, and then softly push her hair back away from her chin.

She's perfect, and she opens her eyes, and I love her.

draws her left arm down

I meant right. Sorry.

Aw, mcgraw, that was very sweet. Thanks!

Well, you look really great in your flickr photo.

And then there was the shoutout to everyone.

I wish I could travel across vast spanses of time and space. Or that I had a machine that could instantly transport people to different places.

...that too.

Oh, Hugh, I want to do that, too. Here's mine:

Each month I remind myself to attend the local alumni seminar, and each month I find I've forgotten it a few days too late. But this month the reading is "A Midsummer Night's Dream", one of my favorite plays. In seminar, there's a woman in her mid-thirties, a petite blond in an old t-shirt with a visible tattoo on her arm who shares my fascination with the character Bottom. We spend the second-half of the seminar discussing him. Catching me completely by off-guard and leaving me slightly breathless, she invites me to a coffee bar to continue the conversation.

There, I learn she's a full professor of philosophy at the local university, specializing in epistemology. Like me, she's been married and divorced, and has no children (but loves them). We discover that we share the habit of reading ten trashy books for each one we'll admit to having read. She has the entire series of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" on DVD. We amuse each other for an hour by talking about our favorite episodes. She laughs loudly and easily; and though her hair is cut short, she's forced to brush aside the same stray lock from her right eye as it's dislodged by her animated and unselfconscious gestures in conversation. We talk about "The Corrections" for awhile. I tell her about mine and my friend's series of spontaneous "It's a good thing we experience the universe three-dimensionally because..." jokes and she immediately gets into the spirit, offering a handful of her own that would undoubtedly mystify everyone else, everywhere.

Somehow, we find ourselves in her bed and there's been no transition, no moment of awkward verbal maneuvering and innuendo, but instead we've been swept there by the same gentle current that found us laughing in the coffee shop.

I awake the following morning, her breath on my cheek, she's looking at me with a barely suppressed grin on her face. I pull her to me and kiss her...and keep kissing her two-beats longer than we expect, a silent communication. I say, "Let's pack a small picnic and drive north for an afternoon in the mountains" and she replies, "Perfect! Let me pick out some CDs for the car." And so it goes.