Surprise! It's me again. Alice and I have switched days because she's up in Portland visiting family.So the DH and I rented The Bucket List last weekend. I'll admit, I was only half watching it since I was editing, but about midway through (about the time the two ended up in Egypt staring at the Pyramids) I put my computer down and focused on the movie. I love Morgan Freeman, he just has the best voice and he's a phenomenal actor, and this movie was really very touching.
In case you've been living under a rock and aren't aware of the premise, here it is: Two terminally ill men escape from a cancer ward and head off on a road trip with a wish list of to-dos before they die.
Yesterday - coincidentally - a writer friend emailed me with a new book idea. Ironically, it's a take-off on The Bucket List with a very cool twist, but she needs some research and I thought I'd take my blog opportunity today to help her. Her question? What's your bucket list? I've been spending a lot of time thinking about this overnight, and while this probably isn't a complete list, this is what I've come up with (so far):
1. See the Pyramids. (I know. This is in the movie. But I have a love of all things Egypt and this one's on my list as well.)
2. See the Greek ruins and tour the Greek Isles.
3. Scuba Dive off Cozumel. (When the DH and I went to the Mayan Riviera a few years ago, I'd taken classes ahead of time so I could scuba dive in the one area of the world that's considered second only to the Great Barrier Reef. I didn't get to though because I found out I was pregnant with Gremlin #3 shortly before our trip.)
4. Spend a week in paradise with no regard for cost.
5. Find forgiveness. (Sometimes I think I'm there but...I'm really not.)
6. Watch each of my kids graduate from college and (possibly) get married. (Since I'm not terminal, this one's on my list.)
7. Drive a race car.
8. Learn how to ballroom dance all over again. (The DH and I met in a ballroom dancing class in college. I've since forgotten everything I learned.)
9. Do something for someone that changes their life for the better.
10. Hit the NYT Bestseller list with one of my books.
Okay, your turn. Help my friend with her research. What ten things are on your bucket list?
14 comments:
Haven't seen the movie and not sure I will. I have an uwarranted aversion to Jack Nicholson. Not sure why but I can't stand the man. Though I LOVE Morgan Freeman!
No I haven't hit my 4000 words today! I just finished reading over the ones I wrote yesterday.
Anyway, my bucket list:
1) See a play in NY
2)Take the Canadian train clear across Canada
3) Make any top seller book list
4) See my grandkids into adult hood.
5) travel to every state.
6) get an agent
7) Visit a tropical island
8)Write until my brain no longer functions(as in old age not a marathon writing exercise)
9) Bring a ray of happiness to anyone I meet.
10) Survive this summer! Seven grandkids under the age of 5 will descend on me for a week in August!
Interesting blog and on that I had to think about.
Hey, Eli! And I have been known to live under a rock, so I appreciate the capsule premise you gave.
Since I plan to have quite a few more years in this lifetime also, this question requires some thinking, as Paty said. However, if I knew I was going to exit this lifetime within the next year, the major thing on my list would be to make sure my doggies, my kids and my grandkids were going to be OK after I was gone. Though I've already told my two grown sons that I will be back to haunt them. LOL!
I'm going to mop the floors while I think about things to add to my list. No, mopping is NOT on my list. :)
Apparently I've been living under a rock.
This is going to take some thought.
Genene, I should be mopping my floor...
Paty, I despised Jack Nicholson for years too, until he did the move As Good as it Gets with Helen Hunt. Now I can stomach him.
I really do have one of these lists tucked away somewhere. I wrote it about six years ago. If I were to read it now though, I may want to change a lot of the things on it. So, here's an updated version for Eli and her friend:
Travel?
1) Stomp around the Mayan ruins in Mexico.
Career?
2) Get at least one book published.
3) Break into the magazine market with writing and photography.
4) Book at least one wedding job a month.
Family?
5) Live to meet and play with my grandchildren. (This is a steep order, since I had the last two kids in my 40s).
6) Stay married to my DH for the rest of my life.
Misc.?
7)Ride my horse until we're both old. (She turned 10 this month. Do I have to tell my age?)
8)Make a positive difference in people's lives.
9) Move to a better piece of ground and create an awesome flower garden.
10) Maintain a positive outlook on life, even when I'm elderly and in pain.
Some of those are just life goals, not really all things I want to do before I kick the bucket. But for now, that's As Good As It Gets!
you really should scuba dive!! It will change your life.
I saw that movie, Eli, at the theater in Denver last January. There wasn't a dry eye in the house by the end. Awesome movie. Definitely one of my favorites. I've always like Jack Nicholson, and Morgan Freemon is fabulous in every role he plays.
My bucket list. Hmmmm...
1. Travel to "the lands": Ireland, England, Scotland, New Zealand, etc.
2. Be a keynote speaker at a writer's conference
3. Have one of my books made into a movie
4. Create the fine art piece I've been thinking about doing FOREVER!
5. Take a cruise -- first class, of course.
6. Get interviewed on Oprah. 8^)
7. Host a writers' retreat someplace really wonderful and invite all my writer friends from near and far (including my CP in the UK)
8. Donate a million dollars to charity (if I were the Jack Nicholson character, I could do that)
9. Rent a huge house on the Oregon coast and have a family reunion with my kids and grandkids.
10. Get a high six-figure advance for one of my books.
I thought about being on a bestseller list, but it doesn't rank in the top 10 for me. I'd make it #11, however if I want to donate that million bucks, I'd either have to be on NYT list for a few years or win the lottery. Maybe the movie deal will make me rich. It's fun to play with Monopoly money!
I saw parts of this movie on our flight to NY. It wasn't the best, but I like the concept.
It's funny how our lists change over time. At one time, my list would have been way more travel, and way more extreme things.
My list:
1) Raise, happy, healthy, well-adjusted kids
2) Adopt at least one child from foster care
3) Take an Alaskan Cruise
4) Visit Hawaii or another Island(without kids!)
5) Do a mini-triathlon
6) Knit a King Size Blanket
7) Visit Vancouver, Canada again w/ my family this time
8) Take a driving tour of the American West in an RV
9) Take a Driving tour of the Canadian Rockies
10) Have a vegetable garden that actually yields food
11)Work on a farm
12)Publish a Textbook/Speak at an Academic Conference/Get a permanent position or some combo thereof
13) Get an Agent
14) Publish a YA
15) Publish an Adult MS
16) Remodel my house
17) Build a house
18) Ride a horse
19) Go to Disney World
20) Live at a beach for an extended time
I'm sure I have others. . . This is such a great topic that I might steal it for my personal blog later in the week!
Neat lists everyone!
Wavy, come see me and I can take care of #11 and #18! ;)
Great lists, ladies!!
I apologize for not responding sooner. I've been baking in the sun at a swim meet all day. Let me tell you, you have not been to a sporting event (and proved how much you love your child) until you've spent an entire day out in the sun at a swim meet where you give up at least five hours to watch your child swim a total of about 5 minutes. If that is parental love, I don't know what is. ;)
Paty, I'm with you on the "survive the summer" item. Oh, boy, am I there or what.
Genene, I think your one item is probably the most important, but I'm waiting for the other nine. ;)
Kendra - yeah, still waiting!
Danita, I'm not wild about Jack Nicholson either, but he really is a great actor when you think about all the roles he's been in. And though he starts off as a jerk in this movie (like always), he really redeems himself well. I enjoyed him in this one a lot.
Anon - yes, I know. It's on my list. :)
Karen, great list, but I'm curious...what's the fine art piece? Details!
Wavy, kudos to you for considering adoption. My hat's off to you. And I've been meaning to tell you...my agent just made a nice sale on a YA. Kendra shared it with me yesterday (she gets PW).
My fine art piece? It's a cross between a sculpture and a painting and involves old wood, iron, paper and watercolors (and also pastels and colored pencils because I always use multiple mediums when I draw or paint). It's sort of a juxtaposition piece. It'll probably turn out horrible, but I think about it a lot. I just don't have the time or all the tools to make it.
Eli, been there done that. Our oldest daughter was on a traveling swim team for five years. 4th through 8th grade. Our other daughter started swimming because she didn't like sitting around waiting for her sister to swim. The oldest quit when it wasn't fun any more- the swim coach had her swimming with the high school kids to challenge her. she missed her friends and found basketball. Now she wishes she'd stuck with swimming in high school. She goes to the swimming pool three days a week at 5:30 and swims to keep in shape.
I've only made half my goal today. got waylaid having my hair cut and getting a mammogram. Guess I'll have to make up for it tomorrow.
Well dang, Eli, you're keeping track of me. I've long since finished mopping the floor and haven't finished my list.
Let's see what I can add. I think I'd want to pack as much fun and joy into my remaining days as possible. Here are some items (not in any order except the first one).
First of all, I'd win a record Powerball jackpot, and then:
2. Load up the dogs, kids and grandkids in an RV and do an Oregon road trip, stopping at any place that caught our fancy. (My sons and I did a road trip like this down the Oregon coast when they were 8 or 10ish and it was so much fun!)
3. Read all the books in my "to be read" boxes while hanging out on a tropical island.
4. Eat chocolate again!
5. Buy acreage for my doggies, kids and grandkids to enjoy.
6. Buy as many flowering plants as possible and cram them side by side by side on all my acres.
7. Go to every thrift store in town and buy enough clothes to never have to wash any of them, then wash them all anyway and donate them back.
8. Host a BBQ for everyone I know and give them a Christmas present even if it wasn't Christmas.
9. Write letters to my kids and grandkids to be opened after I transitioned to let them know why they were so special.
All of these things would hopefully add up to the major item on my list that I mentioned earlier:
10. Make sure my doggies, kids and grandkids were going to be OK after I was gone.
Then there are those charities I want to support, the projects I want to finish...just too much to do to transition any time soon!
Fun post, Eli!
Interesting blog. I've made lists of personal goals before, but never quite like a bucket list. Here are some things off the top of my head that I'd love to look back on one day and say I'd done.
1. Visit New Zealand.
2. Visit Ireland.
3. Get published!
4. Get over my fear of trail riding. This used to be "learn to ride English", but 11 years ago I joined an adult group English riding lesson -- and rode once a week, every week, until we moved to Oregon last year. We mostly rode in arenas, but sometimes we'd go out on the trails and it'd be a tense time for me for the entire hour. Could be because the ranch I rode at backed up to trails through the Santa Cruz mountains -- beautiful, but nerve wracking when we'd veer off the wider paths and take the deer trails along the side of the mountains. Needless to say, I'm not a very bold rider.
5. Visit the Louvre.
6. Visit all the museums of the Smithsonian. I spent one full weekend touring just Air and Space several years ago and still didn't see everything in detail. I'd love to spend as much time as it takes and see it all.
7. Visit Normandy with my husband and see the town where his father parachuted on D-Day.
8. Write a novel set in San Francisco in the 1930s/1940s.
9. Learn to fly a helicopter.
10. Learn to draw.
Wow! Neat bucket lists. I've been laid up again, this time with thrombosis in the forearm. Just got meds so am trying to catch up and at the same time not type too much. (HA!)
My list (not in any order of importance):
1. Spend some time with and get to know my nieces, whom I've seen about three times in their lives due to living 1200 plus miles away (they are now in their late teens/early 20's.)
2. Make sure I have someone wonderful to watch over mentally handicapped son after I and my husband are gone, hopefully well funded.
3. Totally pay for a brand new truck for my husband with book earnings so he doesn't have to drive his current one with 200,000 miles and caved in dash (from the heat.)
4. Crochet up a storm so I leave a legacy of baby sweaters to my favorite baby in need charity and use up some of my yarn stash. (Wavy, I love the knit the king size blanket! I crocheted a queen size one with roses on top 25 years ago, which my mom still has. You leave a legacy when you do this.)
5. Write a book that changes people or makes them truly happy when they read it.
6. Not frustrate my husband too much by being crabby before I finally kick off.
I think that's it. I'd love to fun my son's autism camp forever, but that would take MONEY. I think I've done everything else that is important to me. :-)
Neat question.
Flo
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