The Bucket List
Maybe you’re one of those people who’s always had their ‘eyes on the prize.’ Someone who plans ahead, makes lists, sets goals, thinks about the future, has a five- or ten-year plan and have been saving for your retirement since your first job. Perhaps you’re more of a ‘fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants’ type, someone who goes with the flow, believes in flexible planning or just setting out on an adventure and seeing where it takes you. You believe that living for today means tomorrow will take care of itself.
Whichever way you are wired (and most of us are likely somewhere in between) there’s no doubt that fewer life events can make you more aware of the finite nature of time and possibility than losing someone you love. Whether you or your spouse are or were older or younger, death has a way of jolting us out of any kind of complacency that there will always be more time to do everything we want to do, see all we hope to see, say every word we want to say.
Certainly sudden death leaves us with a profound feeling of a life ‘unfinished’ as we struggle with the life that might have been, could have been, should have been left to live. The person who dies just after retirement or the one who leaves behind young children, the one taken seemingly in the prime of life with tasks left undone and dreams unfulfilled – all put the fragile, fleeting nature of life into stark relief.
Yet even those who have some time to ‘prepare’ – who experience an illness that will eventually take their life – still feel the regret of time snatched away, future plans that will never be realized, children or grandchildren they may never see grow up. All of us know that we are mortal beings, but we rarely live our lives with this knowledge right in front of us. We get busy and distracted, we put off and postpone, assuming that there will be more time, enough time, plenty of time. Losing your spouse blows this illusion to smithereens.
Early in this century (yes, it’s that recent) people began talking about their ‘bucket lists’ – things they hoped to accomplish before they ‘kick the bucket.’ It’s simply another way of acknowledging that the time to start living is now, because we never know how long we’ll have. But losing your spouse before they’ve had a chance to cross every item off that list (as most of us will) presents you with a conundrum; what do you do with their list? It seems to me upon consideration that items on their bucket list can now find their way into one of three categories; yours, mine or ours.
No doubt there are some things that your spouse alone wanted to do that you will never do because you don’t want to or they would be too hard to do on your own. My husband had a number of sports-related items that frankly were his interests, not mine. I don’t care if I ever go to a World Series game or fish the Miramichi for salmon and I think if the Maple Leafs won the Stanley Cup with Peter not there, I’d burst into tears. After living a year in Africa as a young man, he always wanted to take me there. Will I go on my own? Probably not. Traveling without him is hard, as I’ve already discovered; traveling alone to a place he so wanted to take me would probably feel more bitter than sweet. Part of accepting his loss is accepting that he didn’t get to do everything on his list, or at least his Maple Leafs didn’t!
Yet there were things on his bucket list that I was determined to do in his honour! The summer before he became ill, Peter hand-built a soap box derby car for our eldest daughter to pilot in our local race. The following spring, after he died, I found a small to-do note in his handwriting that said ‘Soap Box Derby – Both Girls’ – so I was determined to make sure that our youngest got to be in the race as her sister had been! The universe miraculously came to our rescue with the help of a local gentleman (a retired engineer and, incredibly, a pancreatic cancer survivor!) who helped Gemma make her car ‘The Patronus Charm’ (named for the spell in Harry Potter that conjures the spirit of a magical guardian that banishes sadness – you cast the spell by remembering your happiest memory.) It just felt right to do this for him and I’m so glad we did. His bucket list item became ‘ours.’
There may be projects from your darling’s life that you want to complete, dreams they had that you can fulfil, pilgrimages you want to take – which will become the last gifts you can give your beloved. There is a wonderful group called ‘Loose Ends’ that finishes creative projects that loved ones leave unfinished. Sometimes it feels really important to tie up those ‘loose ends,’ honour their work, climb the mountain, make the dream come true.
And yet, as time has passed, I realize I’ve begun to create my own bucket list and I’m not waiting to get started on it! (In fact, creating this website is on it!) It has items on it that might surprise Peter, things that not only arise from the person he knew and loved but from the strengths grown in response to his loss, the new life I’ve had to create, the person I’ve needed to become since he left, things that I could never have envisioned ‘before.’
Each of us lives ‘unfinished’ lives, each of us has dreams born in our hearts, each of us has more left to do, more love to give, more worlds (both inner and outer) to explore. Moving through my grief and forward into my life ahead, I’ve come to understand that ‘bucket lists’ – his, mine or ours – are dreams to be sorted through, rearranged, embraced, adapted or released in the changed landscape I now inhabit.
So ask yourself – what’s still on your bucket list? Take all the time you need and you’ll find the right balance between completion and new beginnings, holding on and letting go, honouring the past and setting sail into the future. Good luck and don’t forget your bucket!