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I was 50 when I bought horses. In my 20s, I sometimes lived in a 200 sq ft basement apartment with another guy. I was 28 when I married because I was lucky enough to wait for a good one. I first bought a house at 38, and ended up losing money when I sold it. I was gone 5-6 months each year during most of my time in the military, so my wife stayed home. Later, she shed a ton of tears while putting in 20 hr days Mon-Fri in nursing school. From about year 10 to 25 of my military career, my main reason for staying in was the retirement. However, by staying in as long as I did, I damaged my chances to work afterward. Not a lot of people who want to hire a 54 year old newbie in this economy.

However, we also have been conservative in our spending. Vacations have bordered on unknown for us. We’ve always preferred to keep an old car over borrowing to buy another.

This sounds familiar:

“My wife and I downscaled - she stays home with our five children and we don’t have boats, snowmobiles, personal watercraft, designer automobiles, timeshares in Aruba and the like. Our Windstar is 1998 and our PT Cruiser is 2002.”

For the last few months, we’ve used outdoor rattan in our living room after giving much of our living room furniture to our son. Looking at my living room, every piece of furniture in it was bought used.

I consider myself lucky, but I wasn’t born with a silver spoon in my mouth. My sister beat me by one year in being the first member of our extended family on both sides to graduate college. My wife was so poor growing up in the Philippines that at 5 she was hired out to a wealthy couple. She built fires and cleaned floors with a coconut husk in exchange for food & clothing and permission to go to school.

Yes, at 50 my wife & I bought a couple of horses. Our third was given to us for free by someone that just didn’t want to own him. Turns out the little guy is a very good trail pony - all 13 hands of him.

I’m lucky, but like a lot of lucky people, it wasn’t all luck. What my wife and I have, we have after 25+ years together, and both of us started saving well before we married.

“I am active in the local Knights of Columbus and lector and play organ at our church. There is no way I’d go back to an urban hell hole. We breathe clean air, and the sounds at night tend towards crickets, owls, and the occasional coyote. It’s all choices, dude.”

Well, I don’t even know what the Knights of Columbus are & I couldn’t play a piano or organ to save my soul. Luckily, God doesn’t require that, altho I’m sure he honors it when used for Him. But I sure understand the rest. Living in the desert, my wife & I spend a fair number of evenings watering the trees we’ve planted, watching sunsets, cleaning up the corrals & talking. Having no TV frees up time for talking, and watching sunsets.

I know people who love cities. I hate them. I prefer the crickets, horses and coyotes - we have a lot of coyotes. I also received 50 railroad ties a few days ago, and distributed 25 to where I plan to dig trenches and plant them for erosion control. Another 25 are waiting...I need to do the same to them, but want to get the first load in the ground first. My team for doing that consists of me, Mr Pick & Mr Shovel. Who needs a gym when you have Mr Pick and Mr Shovel and a LOT of digging in hard soil to do?

Choices. Choices and TIME. When Obama tells me I need to “give back”, I want to tell him, “What have YOU given ME?” It is the values you hold, the choices you make, and yes, SOME luck that helps one get ahead. The studies I’ve seen say that if you take a bit of time, marry well, don’t divorce and get as much education and training as you can get, you won’t be poor. Not for long. But yes, life may suck pretty bad for a few years along the way.

I wouldn’t think of denying that luck plays a role. But over time - over 10, 20 or 30+ years - luck tends to even out. What remains are the choices one makes over time. When you & your wife are having a hard time together - and most do have those patches - do you tough it out and learn to love each other more, or quit and get a divorce? When your job really sucks, do you take night classes and prepare for something else, or complain until you are fired? Do you borrow money and play now, or save and hope you live long enough to get some enjoyment out of it?

Some are called to something else. Most of the Apostles died in pain and poor. And I’m not ‘wealthy’. Frankly, lots of folks could point to my 9 year old car and my $3 T-shirts and my $15.88 jeans and call me...well, not wealthy. They’d look at the $25 chairs my wife bought a few years ago off of Craigslist and our rattan love seat and our garage sale dining room table & chairs and call us...well, not wealthy. My horses live in our back yard and we spend about $300/month on hay...not exactly rich folks living.

But we’re happy. We’re together. Our TV is only connected to a DVD player, and we’re living pretty good. And when the rain stops, I’ve got some railroad ties to go set in the ground.

Yeah, I’m a lucky man I guess...