If I Had A Fortune To Spend

A friend recently asked if I had the money, would I live in a house like Downton Abbey. This was my reply:

If I had a fortune to spend, I can't imagine using it to live in a house like Downton Abbey. I might donate some money to maintain it so long as it was open to the public and operated as a museum house.

I'm a long time fan of the PBS series This Old House, so I can imagine the restoration and preservation of historic buildings might become a hobby.

I would love to travel more. And traveling in comfort on long trips would be especially nice. I'm not afraid of flying, but airports make me very nervous, as does buying tickets, checking in luggage, etc. Just having someone there with me to keep me calm would be a huge help. I've never been on a long flight, but I imagine spending more than ten hours confined to a small, cheap seat would be torture. My own private plane or chartered plane might be very nice, but I think two first class tickets would be luxurious enough. One for me, and one for my social secretary/traveling companion/"luggage lifter". (He would probably be in his early to mid 20s. Physical type: slim, boyish with a pretty face. LOL )

Of course I would see to it that my novels are published and promoted. And I would also like to produce documentaries and feature films about LGBT people.

I would like to promote a number of causes like green energy and LGBT rights...do my bit to make the world a better place.

My dream is to have a cottage or a cabin in the woods not far from a town with a train station or an airport so that I would have some place to shop for supplies and I could travel. If I had a fortune, the cottage might become a little more elaborate. I think I'd want to keep the cottage feel, but it would be nice to have a few luxuries...like a guest cottage for friends, maybe a small barn for exercise equipment and a pool table, a small swimming pool and a hot tub and a sauna. And it would be really nice if I had enough wooded acreage for my own walking trail...a half mile loop that surrounds the house and the out buildings. I think I would like it to be near White Sulphur Springs or Lewisburg, WV. There's an Amtrak station in White Sulphur Springs, and a small airport in Lewisburg. The Greenbrier Hotel is in White Sulphur Springs, too. It's a famous luxury hotel, so if I had guests who didn't want to be out in the woods with me, I could put them up there.

I don't like the colder months in WV, so I would winter in Key West. I'd go down there after Christmas and stay until the middle of April. I'd want to go back to WV in time to see the spring leaves and the fruit trees and dogwoods in blossom.

There are a few business enterprises I think I might be interested in--besides producing films. I think I would like to open a camp or a retreat in WV for gay men, sort of like Yosemite's Camp Curry. And maybe a theater nearby for the general public. There are so few cultural opportunities in WV. I think the locals and the tourists would love to see a play now and then in the evening. I know I would, and going all the way to New York to see a professional play can be a bit much even if you do have plenty of money. It’s not likely that either venture would make money, but if they mostly broke even, I'd be happy. I'd feel like I was providing a useful service that made my customers happy.