The Bucket List

“The Bucket List” is an interesting concept: a list of things that you want to do before you die (a/k/a “kicking the bucket”). It’s like a checklist of goals to achieve before it’s too late to achieve them. Some want to provide for someone’s education, others want to see Paris at Chistmas-time, and a surprisingly large number of people want to jump out of a perfectly good aircraft to float down via parachute. The lists are as varied as there are people.

I don’t have a bucket list.

At least…I don’t have a bucket list per se. Sure, there are things I’d like to do that I imagine would be nifty, but the fact is that whether or not they get done doesn’t really affect the value of my life–though I freely admit to error as my hindsight isn’t precognitive.

The fact is that I’ve gotten more from life that I expected. I got to work for several years in satellite space sciences. I got to travel about taking photos of sports I very much enjoy–and got paid for doing it. I still have people I treasure who still also count me as their friend (heaven knows how that happened). I worked the graveyard shift in a convenience store and lived to tell the tale. I saw men walk on the moon on live TV. I’ve gotten to write. I live in the future many thought would be centuries away. I lived in California in the 60s and in the DC area during the nation’s bicentennial. I leaned how to play the guitar and the flute. I can juggle. And a cadre of women stumbled into my life when I wasn’t looking and have been such an unexpected gift to me that it made even the idea of a bucket list totally irrelevant.

I don’t begrudge people their own lists. They have things to do and goals to achieve from the silly to the sublime. I hope they get a lot of what they are looking for. If nothing else, the stories of their journeys are great and I often love listening to them. Me–I’ve already gotten more than I expected. There is no need for a list as my desires are very modest. I’m like a kid at Christmas, the floor littered with gifts, enjoying the wonder of the cardboard box.