I sometimes get asked if I have a bucket list, to which I answer an emphatic NO! Bucket lists are full of guilt and frustration, hypocritical self-affirmation and self-delusion. What do you put on them? Things which will make you look good when asked usually. Would you put "Watch 'Arthur' (with Dudley Moore, not that twat Brand) another 27 times"? Probably not. It might be on your private list, but your public list will contain "Understand 'The Killing' in the original Swedish (or is it Danish)" (or some such twaddle).
On the 1001 things I must read before I die list, would you admit to putting 'A daily diet of Littlejohn'? Or rather 'The complete collection of Dickens'? Once you've finished your list, do you then plunge into it just in case your Maker claims you earlier than expected? You've probably got such a load of depressing cultural classics on there you're more likely to turn to 'How to be a woman' by Caitlin Moran for a good laugh than wade through Homer's 'The Iliad' even it is worthy of study.
Bucket lists are sources of frustration. They sit there glaring at you from the back of your mind, a reminder of your self-delusion; and how many of us need that sort of self-induced hassle? Life is tiresome enough remembering to open one's bank statement, keeping tabs on the kids' activities/jabs/school work and tidying up before the cleaner comes without being prodded by one's better self to tick off items on the list of self-improvement.
I can just see it. Being run over by a bus and mouthing at the ambulance team "Save me, I'm only half way through 'War and Peace' and can't go until I tick it off my bucket list!" Or arriving grumpily at the Pearly Gates and having an argument with St Peter about a few days' respite to finish off the last 416 pages before entering forever-more into the arms of Paradise. In fact there's probably a library of worthy books and a comfy chair just outside so that bucket listers can finish off the read they were whipped away from so unexpectedly.
I don't have a list of 100 places I'd like to see before I die either. As I can never decide, and keep changing my mind anyway, my list would be defunct before I'd even finished it. I could never afford to do all the travelling, so I really don't see the point in going to all that effort. Armchair travel has distinct advantages, the main one being you don't actually have to travel anywhere. No passports, tickets, queues, being treated like cattle, sickness, getting lost, being delayed, missing connections, airline food, certain death from deep vein thrombosis, getting bitten, mugged, or sunburnt, or the worst - deciding you'd made a mistake and it wasn't worth being on your list in the first place.
No, bucket lists are definitely a Bad Idea, along the lines of New Year resolutions which you know will be abandoned before Jan 14, so why bother? I prefer a more wishy washy dreaming, a sort of 'well I'd like to finish this project if I can' or 'I hope this project which is out of my hands but is relevant to me this year gets off the ground'. Then if it doesn't happen, it doesn't really matter because it was all concentrated in the realm of the nebulous anyway, one's amour propre has not been attacked with failure, and you can just pass on to something else without guilt or frustration, like choosing from an untouched box of your favourite choccies.
Happy New Year everyone. I wish you health and contentment for 2012.
