Reply #10: My take on the ending...

[Forkboy]

In the dream he talks about at the end of the movie he says he heads into the snowy mountains (representing his life as a sheriff), and that a man goes on ahead of him (the killer awaiting him, in this case Chigurh). And then he woke up and realized he was in the process of acting out the dream. So, instead of having that dream come true he chooses the safer life of retirement, no doubt influenced by the handicapped friend he visits in the movie, a former lawman who paid a heavy price and is now confined to his wheelchair.

The new breed of criminal that he encounters (circa 1980 Texas, which the movie is set in, when drug smuggling was really taking off) shakes his faith in what he does and whether he's good enough to match them, and the dream he talks about at the end is a way of him saying he finally recognizes that he's out of his league now. Hence, "No Country For Old Men".