Bucket Listless
Before I have to face the heavenly ordeal—
(perhaps discovering that what I’ve scoffed at is for real.)
Before I kick the bucket, and while I’m still alive,
I’ve been told I have to choose a thing or five
and label them my “bucket list,” a practice I abhor,
(and even if I did, I can only think of four
things that might elate me as I shuffle toward the door.)
If I had the energy, I’d surely take to wing
and fly to foreign spaces to see everything
I didn’t see the first time, when I was in my youth
and as short of brains as I was short of tooth.
Something about youth draws fortune to our side,
and when you bring up adventure, I think of ones I tried
and shake my head in wonder, surprised that no one died.
I’d like to go to Ireland or on a last safari,
or maybe back to India to replace the sari
I buried my dear cat in because he loved it so,
yet I fear my energy is at an all-time low,
so I will spend my dotage sitting in my chair,
thinking of adventures that I do not dare
pursuing, for I find I dread their wear and tear!!!
Prompts today are: bucket list, elated, heavenly, ordeal, alive and wings.
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 
I wish I had done more crazy things in my youth. Now, not so much.😛
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Luckily I both did them and survived them. No regrets. Well, few regrets.
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I have to admit, I have no bucket list. Nothing adventurous, anyway. I don’t crave an adrenaline rush. But I would like to finish my novel!
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I would like to finish mine as well, although it is a memoir.. and to get the four I’ve finished into print as I keep delaying and delaying and delaying. I hate the term bucket list, but if I had one it would be to get these writing and publishing tasks finished.
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Funny and wise, Judy. It’s not energy that keeps me from doing them, but I’m not sure quite what it is.
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Ditto but I never got to visit overseas
Sent from Yahoo Mail for iPhone
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I really like that one Judy~! But age has slowed me down somewhat, so being limited more to just sitting my chair, I dream of all those sleepy little villages in the jungle or deserts where I lived and loved in my youth, but thanks to Google Maps and photo I can take a virtual visit.
But unfortunately I find those sleepy little grass huts are gone. The beautiful ladies I loved are probably either grand mothers or dead, and even the rivers that once had produce laden perogues polled up and down by happy smiling natives have actually now dried up, and instead of sleepy natives, I see cars and trucks whizzing along paved roads.
This brings back the old adage that “you can’t go home again”. Even in your part of Mexico, there was a beautiful little hotel in that area that I loved to stay in. It was constructed in an old stone Spanish smelter building with tall cealings and beautiful old antique woodwork in the dining area with a huge fireplace. It was Beautiful with European type service, where I loved to relax. But when I went looking to book a room in it a while back, I discovered that it no longer even existed. I guess an old hotel with about 12 rooms and great service was not profitable enough.
I also, at times am sad that time has not waited for my old age and so many of those memories and beautiful people are just GONE~! I can’t turn back the clock except in my memories~!!!
SMILING SAM,, THE TRAVELING MAN,, no longer on the lam, because he no longer can~!,,but envies those who can.
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For that very reason I choose not to go back to places that I loved in the past. Change, change. The world is full of it.
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Oh short on the tooth. Those were the days when we have energy. Now we are long on the tooth, we can only think about it.
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I love your impish smile, Judy.
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Question,,,, are those Indian feathers, horns, the number of hours till sleep, or a victory sign~?
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Oh look, there is a miracle that just happened~!,,,,, time is going backwards~! The time stamp warp says 1:58 but my clock says 3:20…..Ha when I wrote this it was that time but then my friend Ginny called and we talked longer than usual and now it is 4:15..
She has just sent in her papers for quitting her job in retirement. She will be going to Washington DC at the end of May, and then We were planning a trip to Oregon and down to Mexico after that.
Speaking of not going back. I sat here and saw this little hick town turn into a bedroom CITY in a very short time. Traffic where you would never see another car now has four lane bumper to bumper traffic 14 to 24 hours a day. They actually have 9 large banks in the space of less than 8 blocks~! It is a mad house and the more it goes, the more I want to go back to a less crowded place. My place is now worth enough to live like kings in Mexico~! My only problem is what do I do with all of this “STUFF” ~? My kids do not want my place or anything in it except for what they pick out.
How did you consolidate~?, or did you~? You seem to have a lot of “STUFF” too~!
SAM
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We had six sales, opening up our house and all of our studios. Almost all of our art and house stuff went during those sales and it was a lot of stuff! But everyone had been to our house for open studios and knew how many tools and how much art and how many art supplies we had. We kept the house furnished because we intended to rent it out if we didn’t sell it. But we sold everything else except three of Bob’s sculptures and one of our lamps, two of my lamps. After four or six days of weekend sales, a guy came and bought everything else in Bob’s studio and I had already sold all of my big metal presses and torches and casting tools plus my rolling mills–clay and metal–and a lot of my African beads. Our African art collection all went except for a few pieces we wanted to keep and all of our art collection except for a few paintings by friends and a few by favorite artists. My mother’s silver and my huge flatware set–dishes. I came down to Mexico with just a van load of stuff–mainly books, clothes and art supplies and small tools, and when the house sold four years later, I pulled a travel trailer down with the big sculptures and two small tables which were the only furniture I held on to. I believe I sold the house with all of the furniture in it. It is possible. You just gotta make up your mind what you want to do and then set about making it happen. Come to think of it, we took Bob’s sculptures and lamps that hadn’t sold out of the house and put two or three in the homes of many of our friends. During the 4 years they had them, while we were renting the house out before I sold it, some of them sold. Others were bought by the friends who had had them for these years.. The three that didn’t sell were luckily my favorites or perhaps I just said they weren’t for sale..and I am looking at them now. J
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A brilliant poem Judy.
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Believe it or not, I have only comparatively recently learned what the phrase bucket list means. This is an excellent way of reinforcing it.
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That’s because you;ve already been busy doing what you want to do! Good boy…
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🙂
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I keep my bucketlist next to my f…itlist. They are both under the sign that says ‘why are you reading this instead of out in the garden ?’
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ha
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Well said. Clearly my dotage prefers rocking the chair, …!
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