Dream No. One

Dream No. 1: 62.9 Million Dollars
Caught your attention, didn’t I? Well, it sure caught mine. And in the spirit of Bob Dylan, I’ve decided to write down my dreams …

I had a dream that I won the lottery. No, I don’t “play” the lottery, so there’s virtually no chance that I will ever win the lottery. But still, the dream was so real, I woke up thinking how much people would love me now that I’d won the lottery. I woke up thinking about the new house we were about to build, about the trusts we’d set up for our children, the scholarships we could endow. About the good we could do with 62.9 million dollars.

And then I really woke up. I reached over and woke Mike up to tell him about my dream. He said, “62.9 million dollars. That’s kind of a weird amount. Pretty specific. Maybe you should go buy a lottery ticket.” That’s the kind of guy he is — one who doesn’t laugh at your dreams, even if they are of the laughable variety.

But we started talking and for some reason, we started “spending” the 62.9 million dollars.
Mike: You know, there are fees with winning the lottery. You’ll have to decide if you want it all at once or if you want to get it little bits at a time.
Me: I’ll take it all at once, that way it’s done (like a cookie, done).
Mike: OK, well, that means you’ll end up with about half.
Me: OK, so now I’ve got about 31 million dollars. What should I do first?

And so we came up with a spending plan. (No, we really don’t have this much free-time, but we’re both home during the day, so we talk about insane things like winning a 62.9 million dollars that I won in a dream).

Here’s what we came up with:
3.1 million to Young Life (yeah, our high school friends would really love us!)
1.5 million to the BS Church of God—my cousin’s husband Pastor’s this tiny church and they’d love to buy property to one day have room to grow.
1.5 million to BSFBC—our church. We would love to provide a new bus for our Children’s Ministry, we’d love to help the English as a Second Language program that our church historian, Evelyn Henderson has so tirelessly worked with for many, many years. And other programs that we love there.
1.5 million to Rice Bowls. Really, do I need to explain this further?
1.5 million to Inc (Involvement Through Newspapers and Civics)

At this point it’s important to note that we’d “spent” roughly 9.1 million dollars, leaving us with an imaginary 21.9 million dollars. And we had a pretty lengthy discussion about how really, disgustingly rich people go through life with insane amounts of money and find enough worthwhile ways to spend it. And I should mention that when we told my father-in-law about my dream, he suggested we invest wisely and live off the interest of our investments. So that was a factor. We went on to plan …
1.5 million — To buy property and build a new home (I won’t go in to the plans, but know that there was extensive talk of what our new home should have).
2 million — For both sets of parents to use as they saw fit (Even in my dreams I’m trying to trick my in-laws in to thinking I’m wonderful)
1.5 million — (each) Trusts for our children (Again, know that there were stipulations, but I can’t even begin to go there!)

We’re down to 15.4 million imaginary dollars — important to say since it’s possible we were getting a little carried away with our imaginary winnings.

So we thought that we’d provide for our nieces and nephews. So, a large chunk (about 3 million) would go in trust for them.

Now, we wanted to have a gardener who would bail our hay; my friend, Summer, suggested that I hire her to wash my hair everyday; I insisted that I’d need someone to clean my house so I’d have time to do good in the community, be a room-mother, and ride my horses (not necessarily in the order). Mike still wanted to work, but liked the idea of not having to work (therefore negating the fear that comes every time someone whispers layoffs). But outside of that, we were stumped. I mean, I’m sure we’d spend a lot on trips (the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Australia — for the zoo, of course — Greece … ), and we hoped to make some wise investments, but that was it. We were finished spending (although we would probably still end up giving $25 a year to the State Troopers).

So, how would you spend your 30.1 million dollars (after fees, of course)? And if you want to give to any of my favorites, just click on the name of the organization and find out more about them. And also, tell me about other non-profits or worthy causes that you love. Or check them out by following my link to the Charity Navigator to see how much of what you give goes to the cause (although some are still too small to make it to their list).