He connected, he cared, he died.

So many dreams I have had, each one makes me stop and reflect. I remember the bible stories of troubled rulers… kings and princes, and how the interpretation of the dream leads to success or failure… but what is the proper interpretation of a dream? Who can tell?

“For years, my mind was consumed by the mechanics of the trade—HVAC, calculated career moves, and getting a Minnesota boiler’s license before I even fully understood what a boiler was. But today, I’m not thinking about the trades. I’m thinking about a dream that woke me at 3:00 AM… 

But boilers are not what I want to write about today… I want to write about my dream. Not the dream of having freedom to travel, see the tetons or hike colorado mountains… I am talking about the dream that wakes you in the middle of the night and keeps you from sleeping… not a nightmare, A DREAM!

My dream last night woke me at about 3 am and would not allow me to drift back to visit, rather I was “Awake, Alive and Enthusiastic” AGAIN! These dreams seem to come more frequently as I get older, but usually my dreams contain details of my many projects and plans… This one seems to be advice, a reflection or maybe a warning…

Let me set the stage: His name? Tom. One of my old bosses, one of a very short list that actually seemed to care about me and took the time to visit with me about life… but I always wondered… who visits with Tom? Does anyone stop and listen to him? For years we talked about his passion to hike in the Colorado mountains. I never made it there but we shared the same passion and excitement about ultra light weight back pack camping and silly motos like “LEAVE NO TRACE”…

In a way, that’s how he lived his life, no trace, quietly sinking into a gin bottle. He died at age 66. 

I had a few influential bosses over the years but Tom? He always seemed to have genuine concern. When he passed away I was living up north and had not heard from him for years. This disconnect when I move away seems to be more normative than the exception. I left highschool, I don’t see or hear much from my classmates. I moved from Ramsey to Belle Plaine, that’s pretty much the end of all those folks as well. I leave a job and all they say as I walk out is “Hey, can you make sure to leave the door key? We are running low.” I don’t get invitations, cards, flowers and other social items that establish community connection. I just drift in like an unfamiliar scent on the wind and then disperse into the ether as a vague, unfamiliar encounter. 

That’s why Tom had such a deep impact in my life, He connected, he cared, he died. 

Back to my dream last night: 

Jess and I were out and about and we stumbled into Tom and his wife, they both had big afros. (I have no idea why!) Tom had traditionally been a thin man but today he was plump, but not too plump… he looked healthy, and I mentioned this to him, I told him he looked great and I was glad to see he had gained weight after he retired… he looked at me and mentioned that retiring was the best thing he ever did and recommended I retire early… he said he never lived so much as after he retired. And then in a flash, he was gone, only his faceless wife remained in my dream, and she slowly drifted off into the mist. 

The sad part about Tom? I moved up after quitting my Job where he worked in 2018, he climbed into his Gin Bottle pretty hard before I left and he died in 2021… Three years after I left. While I was still working I saw a few other guys work until they were dying as well, each one built a fortress of retirement so tall and so powerful that they were all going to have a great, wealth filled retirement… None of them lived long enough to actually enjoy it, except maybe two out of I don’t even know how many guys. I saw them work into the age of retirement only to knock on death’s door and be invited in.

I recently found out I am dying… How? Someone told me the rumor… the truth? No, I am not dying… It seems there is a powerful rumor about this..  and it seems to be concentrated in a specific “community” of my recent past. I have been rumored about in the past, afterall… I went through a horrible divorce in a small town… but this community? It seems to be the “lifeblood”.

 But this sure makes me stop and think, nobody knows the last breath date or time, yet we all will pass over the threshold of this life to the next. Either into the beautiful golden streets of Heaven or the fiery lake of hell… I wonder how many of those old friends I will see again? Worked their entire life, built a kingdom, lived the American dream!

So many guys build a plush retirement only to find that the light at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming train. If we are on the wrong tracks, how do we switch them this late in life? The end. it comes to us all, but it’s not the end of this life we should be concentrating on, it’s if we are on the right set of tracks, and entering the right dark tunnel. 

Is it possible to change tracks? I think it’s time to change our destination, but the question for me is this… How does switching tracks look, this late in my life? Is it a derailment? Is it an unforeseen and unexpected “switch” in this dark tunnel? Is it stopping inside the tunnel and breathing the thick black smoke of the coal fired engine so as to reverse back out? 

For me, it looks like a deliberate halt. I have started the liquidation of all my projects… Selling all my diesel trucks, engines, transmissions, turbos, alternators, injection pumps and all the other “accessories I have accumulated, like a 6-pack of oil filters that got misplaced in the mess… Do I scrap my newly constructed smoker? (It holds 12 chickens at once and works fantastic!)  How about the garden? Or worse yet… What do I do with all parts I have in inventory for HVAC?  It’s  time to stop building bigger barns and sell the overstock of wheat!  

This dream I had is not the catalyst I needed to move forward, it’s only the confirmation God has provided to do the right thing and build my future before I meet him… FACE TO FACE… and talk to him as a man would talk to another man. 

This life is great, I love living, I have loved all my projects and I have been a very successful business man, but I also see the beauty in downsizing before I am forced to by my kids or an ailment that decides what I will be doing the rest of my life. 

But my question for you is this…. Are you so busy building a future that you don’t have time to live? Are you so tired from building your retirement that you can’t enjoy what you have? Are you spending the last healthy years earning your future that your future engulfs you today?

Even more than that, do you know where you will be when the door you knock on is death? When you step across that threshold that can not be “reversed” out of, will you see your savior or your conqueror?  

In the balance of life, there is only one true hope, it’s not found in a gin bottle, it’s not found in a lucrative retirement investment and its not found in a well thought out strategy… The one true hope is Jesus, so my advice? “Know Jesus and make Him the Lord of your life, not the retirement you have or the projects you make or the people you trust” 

When life derails, or you need to switch tracks or perhaps just stop and reverse out of the tunnel, do so in prayer… C.