When first I heard of Bucket lists, I had no clue what they were, of course. ('Of course, you didn't. When have you ever known anything,' you say? Moronic of you, really. If I already knew of something, how could it be the FIRST time I heard of that thing?) As usual, some kindly friend (whenever a friend actually thinks I can understand anything, I call him 'kindly') explained what it was all about.
From what I understood, it was sort of a list of things that you wanted to do before you kicked the bucket, shuffled off the mortal coil, or some such euphemism for the day you decide that getting out of bed was too much trouble and decide to sleep undisturbed forever.
That, to me, seemed like better than those New Year resolutions. I mean, with these NYRs, you just get an year to do those things...unless you are fool enough to resolve to do things every day of that year. So, it's like you already start kicking yourself by the third month for not having made a start on it. And, if you are like me, keep kicking yourself every day till the sixth month and then give up on it.
But this bucket list thingy...why, you just want to do it before you die. So much time left, especially considering that every person sort of feels that, "Yeah! I suppose, in theory, people have to die. But, me, I'm sort of immortal, you know." Not exactly immortal perhaps but, no matter how old he or she is, death never really seems imminent. So, this bucket list seemed like a nice way of giving yourself a pat on the back for planning to do things, even to dream of doing them successfully, without actually having to do them or giving yourself a hard time for not making progress on them. (Unless you have got one of death's angels hovering over you, in the form of a fatal disease, in which case you are not really going to stress yourself about the items on your bucket list, now, are you?)
Sort of like those TBRs. The 'to be read' lists of books. I mean, I never really made them, you know. If a book interests me, it is BOUGHT. Having spent the money on the book, I WILL read it in the near future. If I do not have the money right then it is on my shopping list. Which, apparently, is not the same as this TBR, from what I understand. A TBR is sort of an Expression of Interest, as I understand, and not a firm decision to buy and read. I never did see the point in making a list of books that I may possibly be interested in. Though, to be sure, I probably miss out on making friendships on the cheap. Keeping a few social media author friends happy by telling them that their books are on my TBR and promptly forgetting the books thereafter.
Anyway, this bucket list seems more like TBR to me than NYR. Items on the list are the sort of things that people would like to be seeing themselves as doing some time in their life. Not right, now, you understand, because right now they have more important things to do. Not THIS coming vacation, either, cos this vacation they plan to chill out in Manali. Some indeterminate time in the future, when all the stars align and nothing more interesting or urgent interferes...
I discover this useful thing now. Basking in the glory of having on my bucket list interesting things like 1.Learning to play the guitar (So what if I cannot hold a tune in a bucket) 2. Ascend the Everest (Hard sell, this, I think. Nobody will give me any Brownie points for this after seeing me stop and huff every step of the way up some 7-8 stairs.) 3. Go Scuba diving...
I mean, like, I could have had people looking up to me for my interesting and adventurous nature without breaking a sweat, so to speak. Too bad that I got to know of it when my foot is a scant half-inch away from the bucket.
Ah! Well! Whatever else I may regret not doing, when I kick the bucket, I don't suppose not making a bucket list is going to be one of them.
