Curing Cancer with Lottery Winnings

Yes. Yes. The entire house is sick. We all have blood running out of our eyes. And while I've sequestered myself upstairs with my new Neti Pot I'm still feeling pretty good.

As far as I know I don't have pancreatic cancer.

Randy Pausch does.

I realize that the perspective Pausch's Last Lecture has provided probably won't last much longer than 11:30 p.m. tonight when I go to bed. But for now I feel moved enough by it to mention it to you.

Pausch talks about dreams. I keep thinking about my childhood dreams. I never had any; really. I remember day dreaming a lot about taking a pet lion to school. I also spent a lot of class time on a spacecraft that had unlimited range and maneuverability yet was small enough for me to park near the bicycle racks. Then there was my bubble city. That was a major project.

So I suppose had dreams but never the kind that translate well to anything attainable in my adult life. Sure, I could have been a lion tamer or aeronautical engineer but as elaborate as my fantasies may have been, they really weren't rooted in anything my unambitious adult-self could hope to make come true.

I'm not pouting. I just hear this dying guy tell me about the importance of making your dreams come true and I'm not really sure if I have any beyond the oh so very pedestrian rock star kind of stuff.

So what do I dream of now?

If I think about it I suppose I waste a lot of time on spending imaginary lottery winnings. I also save a lot of important people (or people significant to me) from things like minor harassments all the way up to certain doom. Every now and again I find myself autographing slips of paper on my desk. Best wishes, Ted. Thanks, Carol. Greg Lee. Not really sure who Ted and Carol are and why they would want my signature, but it's somehow gratifying to go through the motions.

But these aren't the kind of "dreams" that make a difference. There will be no cancer cures stemming from me imagining how I'm going to save the entire fourth floor of my office building from terrorists. And that's too bad because maybe I could have saved someone like Randy Pausch. A guy who has the kind of dreams that eventually make a difference in someone else's life.