To Do

When I was a teenager living out of a couple of cardboard boxes so long ago, I pacified myself by dreaming up a To Do Before I Die Or Turn Thirty Which Is Pretty Much The Same Thing list in a blue-ish colored journal that my high school track coach had given me "to write, well, whatever it is you're always writing" in. In case you care, My Bucket List of sorts contained about a dozen or so tasks, once you took away the ones that I'd put lines through. Not because I'd checked them off of as accomplished, because anyone who knows me knows that I'll occasionally get the brilliant idea to tackle utterly pointless things that aren't humanly possible, such as the time I decided to install very, very heavy hurricane shutters. By myself. As the storm blew in. And the wind adjusted to a little over a hundred miles an hour.

It's been over a decade since I've looked at that list, over ten very long and productive years filled with wood floor installations, all nighters at the office, negotiating deals, sleeping on concrete floors, designing bathrooms, and lots and lots of coffee. As far as I know, the actual physical list is some four hours away in a landfill in Fort Lauderdale. Either that or in a storage unit that I shared with an ex-boyfriend. I'm not certain which, because there isn't a goshdarn thing in the world that would lure me back into seeing that Elitist Loving Closet Racist Who Makes My Skin Crawl (who is not Mr. Florida, if you're wondering) face to face, least of all collecting my baby book and a journal that I'd had since high school. No matter, though, because I remember most of what was on that list by heart.

Today, I was walking back from The 'Bucks, and for some reason I began contemplating revamping My Bucket List, you know, making it into one that doesn't end at the big three-oh. Because lo and behold life does go on past thirty, or it has for the last few months anyway, keep all of your fingers and toes crossed.

I'm sure that thirty year olds all across America have ancient To Do Before I Die Or Turn Thirty Which Is Pretty Much The Same Thing lists just like mine, except maybe not, because only now when I'm trying to edit it do I realize that I didn't include a single thing about family or marriage or giving back to my community. Maybe it's because I didn't think it was necessary to pass along my ultra long supermodel legs or share my overwhelming patience and understanding or maybe it's because I was simply a complete and total idiot back then. It's a crap shoot either way.


Checking "see live brain coral" off The List by snorkeling in Belize.

I mean, for crying out loud, I can only "swim with sharks" and "see the ball drop in New York" and "take a jiu-jitsu class" and "ski down a Black Diamond and live to tell about it" and "go rock climbing in South America" and "buy a motorcycle" and "eat fish and chips in Piccadilly Square" and "learn to kite surf" and "keep an herb garden alive for more than a month" and "jump out of an airplane" and "live on the beach" so many times...