Who Dat?

Once in awhile you just have to go first class!  Of course, there are a lot of If’s attached to that. If you can afford it, if it is worth it and for some people…if you are debt free, if you are financially independent and if you are no longer part of the 9 to 5 world because you saved enough to purchase your freedom.  I can check all of those boxes and so can seven of my favorite friends, so when one of them texted an invitation to me and to the other six about spending a weekend in New Orleans to enjoy the haute cuisine and also one of the premier NFL matchups of the year (Saints vs Rams), I said sure!

 

What does a weekend for eight in New Orleans cost?  Well the 8 game tickets were $3,050 for Bunker Club 40 yard line lower deck seating.  It is unbelievable how big those NFL guys are when you see them up close!   The hotel bill was $2,800.  That’s only half of what it could have been because we always room two together to add to the camaraderie of our sports outings. Food was a biggie, because you know it is New Orleans and the Redfish Grille and Court of Two Sisters aren’t budget restaurants.  All in eats and drinks ran about $4,300 for the weekend.  Transport, since we are within driving range was about $1,600 for the four vehicles involved.  Miscellaneous shopping was around $800.  That adds up to $12,550 or about $1,570 each, for a football weekend.

 

The better part of two grand is a lot of money for a 3 hour football game and a couple of days walking around the French Quarter.  On the other hand, it is an insignificant part of my world at this point in my financial journey.  And for the others it is merely pocket change.  The group included three former CEO’s of large corporations, a surgeon, the owner of a large company, a wealthy accountant, a former C-suite executive of a Fortune 500 and me.  While I have a reasonable amount of assets by most people’s standards, I cannot measure up to any of them financially.  But these are warm, wonderful guys and they treat me just like they treat each other, with the same razor sharp wit and sarcasm you’d expect from any group of close friends.

 

We all match the image of the old American dream, each of us started in modest circumstances and each of us have become financially independent as a result of our careers, no trust fund babies in the group.  In my case my dad was middle class and I worked my way up in the corporate world because I was the rare engineer that could also write and speak well before groups.  The former CEO’s were born in Podunk little towns and worked hauling hay or on the docks.   One even obtained his law degree in night school while working a full-time job. The trucking company owner worked with his dad to build a profitable operation out of nothing.  The doctor got his medical degree courtesy of the Army and served our country for many years in return.

 

In the conversations over the weekend I noticed a few things that were common traits.  Reading was one, we all were voracious readers of non-fiction.  Another was fitness, everyone was a gym rat to some extent, except for me and I am a runner and tennis player.  Strong family ties were another common trait.  Even though not every marriage had worked out they were great fathers and very committed to their kids and spouses.  Adventure travel was a common theme. Most of us enjoyed  hiking,  mountain trekking, running or cycling and had traveled more of the world than average, although I was bringing up the rear in that category.

 

There were differences too.  I was the only STEM guy in the group unless you count the doc. By majors we had one engineer, one lawyer, one physician, one accountant and four business majors.  Six or seven of the group were former Greeks, as in fraternity members.  Only the engineer, me, and one of the others never pledged and never wanted to. The other seven were popular kids in high school and on their school sports teams, I was a late bloomer and only found my groove once I was launched on my career.  None of them were overnight successes and none of them were millionaires in their thirties.  None of them retired early or even slightly early, except me.  For most of them work was their main hobby and it was a hobby they loved.  In spite of that all of them seemed to truly enjoy their retirement.  However, retirement for them included being on corporate boards for which they receive significant compensation as well as volunteer work.  And in my case retirement involves paid consulting a day or two a week and much non-paid volunteer work.

 

Two of them have not retired, and not surprisingly they are the two that own their own companies.  One is the surgeon who owns his own clinic and practice and one owns a trucking company and has a lot of real estate.  They both are struggling a little bit with what retirement will look like for them since they have no heir apparent to take over their business if they stop working.  The surgeon can scale back his hours, and in fact has already begun to do that but the trucking guy, that’s a harder problem to solve.  His is a business he built with his dad, and walking away from something like that is not an easy choice to make.  There are far too much blood, sweat and tears invested.

 

Are they happy?  I am, and I believe they all are.  It is a ridiculously optimistic group and for good reason.  They can base their anticipation of future joy on a lifetime of past successes.  All of them have faced tough situations but the pattern of their lives, and mine, is winning more than we lose.  And of learning from losses and getting back up and moving forward again.  We are all boomers so we share parents that were of the Greatest Generation even though they are almost all gone now. In each of our cases they patterned grit and perseverance for us and left us with family names that we dare not tarnish.

 

On the other hand, we recognize our privileges. We are white males, we had stable two parent homes and our parents paid for our college educations so we graduated debt free.  We also had outgoing personalities and lots of confidence and built networks that gave us a huge advantage over the less connected people we competed with.  Nobody feels apologetic about their success any more than those NFL players have to apologize for their incredible speed, coordination and strength.  Just like them, our success has been a combination of things we did nothing to earn along with things we worked hard to develop. All of us have a desire to see others reach their full potential and all of us volunteer in areas that help others in need.

 

It was a great football game, perhaps the game of the year in the entire 2018 NFL season to date.  Certainly, it was two of the most talented teams in football going toe to toe in a game with drama to spare.  And it turned out well for the eight of us since we live in New Orleans Saints territory!  Who dat say dey gonna beat dem Saints?  But the value of the weekend had little to do with football.  It was about the stories we told each other about our parents, our kids and ourselves.  Just as our parents have mostly passed, we are now rapidly becoming the “old guys”.  And old guys are much more reflective on the past.  I’m very happy that our reminiscing is about the good times we have had so far on this journey and the ones still ahead.  There was scarce little regret voiced about the past in spite of some divorces, spouses that died out of time and kids who are still trying to get life sorted out.  It occurred to me that these men did not spend much time worrying about things they could not change but focused on the best future they could imagine.

 

It is often said you are the average of the five people you hang around with.  I hope so, because my friends are the kind of people I want to be.  Their positive, optimistic and giving natures are good examples and they inspire me to be a better person.

 

What about you?  Do you have a group of quality friends that you want to be more like? 

 

Or are you spending more time with people who are going nowhere?   

 

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