Personally, I worked for 10 years programming for a large organization ( non-profit, but large ). When I was "no longer needed" I cast about for a couple of weeks, took a brief vacation with my wife and 3 daughters and finally accepted a proposal to start a software company with 2 others. This was in 1976, and over th next 5 years we established a number of sites, some nice networks of mini-computers, wrote a little systems software, developed a line of hand-held OCR ( optical character recognition ) entry devices -- attached by what is called today a "keyboard wedge" to IBM, Burroughs and Four Phase Systems computers. My wife approached me and said that I was working too hard, gone on too many trips, and she and the girls missed me. So, about this time, my 2 partners left the business, I was the junior-most and was left with 100% of the stock and 100% of the DEBT -- DEBT that had somehow been "hidden" up until their departure. Needless to say, I was moved by my wife to "pull in my horns" and do business locally -- kept the first one alive as long as I could, but with the help of an attorney ( Advocat / barrister ? ) was able to dissolve that original corporation in bankruptcy court. Since 1983, I have been working out of offices in Pasadena California -- home of the Tournament of Roses every New Years' Day. Two of our 3 daughters have completed university, the third is severely visually disabled and lives at home still. But onto the career: Through the 1980's rode the swell of economic growth in U.S., actually felt blessed to be able to travel as little as I did and still earn a nice living. Been coding Fox since 1987, when our PC group felt that the dbase LAN Packs were absolutely not worth the money ( first multi-user app had transactions in the 1 minute range, on original 808x PC's -- converted to Fox and that dropped to sub 10 second range -- no coding changes! ) Attended the 1989 Developer's conference in Toledo Ohio -- where I was born. Since then, we have added some languages, stopped installing LAN's ourselves and right now are concentrating on a product: Quote Desk 32 ( see http://www.QuoteDesk.Com ). You are right about two sides of the coin, only now that house is paid for, children are through college, do I recognize all the work!!! But I have been blessed to be married to a loving wife, who ably assists my thinking about the really important matters, and although I don't have an office on east and west coasts and don't travel much -- normally when I do, she can accompany me and we can find a few moments to relax. May I wish you the best in your endeavors, and with the terrific support I have been getting from the Universal Thread group, you will probably see me popping up there now and then -- still got a few working years left in me. T.T.F.N.