Because I Can
Do you have a bucket list?
That’s a list of things you want to do or accomplish before you ‘kick
the bucket’ (die). Many baby boomers
have such a list. Younger and older
people too, probably.
Items on a bucket list often include outlandish, exciting, thrilling and dangerous activities like skydiving or wrestling an alligator. Less adventurous people might list travel destinations or people they want to meet.
I’ve been thinking about my bucket list a lot lately. My new-found life alone has opened up
opportunities that used to have limitations.
I believe I will live a long time, and therefore I have plenty of time
to check off items on my list. But life
can end or become debilitating in the blink of an eye, so why should I wait for
some uncertain tomorrow to do things I want to do?
The items on my list might seem odd but some are on there just
because I want to challenge myself.
There are things I want to do and places I want to see. Although I might explain my strategy here, I
do not have to explain this to anybody.
These are things I want to simply because I can – or I believe I can.
A small sampling:
- Interview a U.S. President.
I’ve interviewed mayors, Senators and Representatives, so why not a
President?
- Learn to speak Italian.
- Visit Tuscany and have a conversation with a local, in
Italian.
- Build up my chest and arm muscles to the point where I get
noticed. I’ll never be a body-builder
but I like the attention sometimes. And
I’d like to think age shouldn’t limit me.
My occasional lack of motivation might limit me but age will not.
- I’d like to have … wait, I can’t say that one here. Sorry.
Moving on …
- Ride a shift in a hurricane hunter airplane. OK, this might be the only thing on my list
that is dangerous enough that I’d have to sign a release. And I might actually be scared. But I want to do it.
- Write a book, publish it and sell enough copies to cover my
costs. As I’m writing this, I recall
that I’ve blogged about some of this before.
Hmmm, I guess this post is a bit of an update.
- Learn to play a musical instrument with enough precision to
confidently perform a little bit in front of an audience. I have played trombone and bass guitar in
public but was not very good with either and never did a solo. I also studied saxophone for a few months. I am actually shopping for an acoustic guitar
and contacted a neighborhood music school about lessons.
- Get a college degree.
It is difficult for me to admit that I stopped going to college in my
third year and changed majors so many times that I never progressed to any
advanced classes. I started again just a
few years ago but stopped. I will start
again.
- See a tornado. I
actually did see one a few months ago, but it wasn’t a well-formed one. I want to see one of those ‘we’re not in
Kansas anymore’ tornadoes … from a safe distance.
- Have a birthday party on my 100th birthday. Wow, what will our lives be like in another
forty or fifty years? I want to blog
about that when I get there. And give a
speech about it to whoever is there. And
play a song on my guitar. Because I can.
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