Thinking about “bucket lists”.
I have done a lot of things in my life simply because I wanted to. And I have had the somewhat rare privilege of independence from employers.
But as an adult I spend a lot of time on things I must do. I must clean my house. I must work. Because these things have to happen and I am the only one here.
But, at 66 I am deeply aware that time, for me, is limited. I don’t know how many “good” years I have left. It could be 30. Or it could be 5.
So I am thinking about what I want. Not what I need or should do. And that is, I suppose, what a “bucket list” is. It is about desire.
Most people have a lot of travel on theirs. My travel would be different. The world has changed and not for the better. I want to see Eurasia, but not now. I want to visit it 100 years ago, or even 50. And that is impossible.
I am also ruling out items which are, for me, as impossible as time travel. I have limited money, limited time, and limited energy.
So the travel portion of my list has to have a few very specific characteristics. It must be a place with beauty that is unchanged. A place I can photograph and get something of value. A place that could still take my breath away.
Or, if it isn’t a pristine sight, it should have food impossible to understand or even access, without going to the place where it is native. For example, I hear that bananas are a thousand times better fresh picked when ripe. So a place in banana country would work for me. Parts of Eurasia also qualify, for the cheese or the fresh noodles or any number of other things. But may be out of my reach.
Right now I am thinking of the painted desert. It is within reach and is an extraordinary sight.
I am sure I will think of more.
What determines your list? Do you include things that you can probably not pull off, for various reasons?
What will you do for the remainder of your one precious life?
Part 2: .I'm currently living in Acadia National Park on Mount Desert Island, on the coast of Maine. This is one of the most beautiful places I've ever been The air is beautiful and the light is a photographer's dream. Georgia O'keefe felt that way about New Mexico. I've lived in New Mexico, an hour from Taos. But O'keefe never came here, or she would have stayed here, because this place dwarfs any place I've ever been in the US, although Highway 25 from Denver to New Mexico is the most beautiful road in the United States. I hope we meet someday, Annabel. I've been entranced by your writing, as I was by Taos News before the Pandemic and while I was living in New Mexico a few years ago. You're only a few years older than me, and I've been surprised during the past few months, to discover that we have so much in common, have so many shared experiences, without knowing each other and never having met. I'm going to be sixty years old in December. I'm planning to go on an adventure. Thinking about Sicily and then sailing to Greece, and finally busing to Shkoder Albania, where I lived for a season a few years ago and where I have friends. But who knows where the time goes? Life is beautiful. Live your dream. Live long, and prosper.
I am living my bucket list. Quire a few years ago I returned to the cabin in the Maine woods where I'd lived with my husband. The property was eerily quiet. His rusted and rambling Lincoln Continental was parked in the driveway and the air inside was stale, while the air outside was so still that I wondered if there were any molecules of oxygen left in the atmosphere. I found Hank dead on the floor of the kitchen. Our pitbull, Elvis was still standing near the lifeless body, presumably guarding him, because Elvis took his "job" seriously, and was a helluva good guard dog. This was the moment when life pivots and changes, and the trauma forever changed my life, changed me. I realized that "someday" never comes. SOMEDAY IS NOW..At that heartbreaking moment, filled with the devastation of loss and grief, I simply walked away from my life as I'd known it. I left everything behind, and have no idea what happened to the properties I owned, the debts I'd paid, or the people I'd known. I just abandoned the "American dream" I'd been sold, and for which I'd been paying dearly. The American Dream means endless toil and insurmountable debt. Hank and I were together for twenty years. We never saw each other, barely knew each other, because we were always working, sometimes two or three jobs at a time during "the season." We were preparing for our retirement years, when we could finally start living. But when Hank died, I learned that you can't ever get back TIME. Life passes by us in a blinding speed of light. Materialism is completely useless because you can't take it with you. The hard reality is that we're born naked and afraid, and we die alone with nothing to comfort our passing. My father died in my arms, of lung cancer. I was the only one there. I doubt that my presence comforted him. And in the end, he was just weak and afraid, not the holy terror I'd known and both hated and loved at the same time. Life is often cruel and no one escapes their fate, even in death. I choose to live. I choose freedom. I choose to love humanity, while often hating humans. I am on a lonely road and I am traveling. In the past decade I've lived in Australia, Spain, Ecuador, Galapagos Islands, Ireland, Croatia, Albania, Turkey, and Honduras. In the US I live out of my suitcase, and work seasonal jobs at expensive resorts, or I just follow the sun and go where the wind takes me. I've visited or lived in most of the US states, with the exception of Alaska, Hawaii, the Dakotas, Louisiana....I'm currently living in Acadia National Park on Mount Desert Island, on the coast of Maine. This is one of the most beautiful places I've ever been The air is beautiful and the light is a photographer's dream. Georgia O'keefe felt that way about New Mexico. I've lived in New Mexico, an hour from Taos. But O'keefe never came here, or she would have stayed here, because this place dwarfs any place I've ever been in the US, although Highway 25 from Denver to New Mexico is the most beautiful road in the United States. I hope we meet someday, Annabel. I've been entranced by your writing, as I was by Taos News before the Pandemic and while I was living in New Mexico a few years ago. You're only a few years older than me, and I've been surprised during the past few months, to discover that we have so much in common, have so many shared experiences, without knowing each other and never having met. I'm going to be sixty years old in December. I'm planning to go on an adventure. Thinking about Sicily and then sailing to Greece, and finally busing to Shkoder Albania, where I lived for a season a few years ago and where I have friends. But who knows where the time goes? Life is beautiful. Live your dream. Live long, and prosper.