There is no way I can get it all in! My List is far too long! I must cross-out, eliminate, and erase some of the items on my Bucket List! It is a very difficult thing to scale back, to squash dreams, to erase hopes, to cancel yearnings, and to cross-out those many places I’d like to go and those many things I’d like to do before I “kick the bucket.” One of the things I’ve wanted to do for years is to go back to the island of Crete, rent an apartment for a month in some small village, and simply enjoy the enchanted island and its people again. [I lived on the island for a year and a half some 55 years ago. I returned 35 years later and visited for several weeks and then again visited for just a day or two some 15 years ago]. For several years now I’ve tried to work out my Bucket List visit to Crete for a month and it just hasn’t panned out. What should I do?
Crossing-out or erasing such a fantastic dream as spending a month on Crete from my Bucket List is just more than I can handle. Trimming seems wiser than crossing-out. So it is that next week we will go—not just to Crete—but to Athens and Delphi, Greece, and to Santorini, Mykonos, and other Greek Islands. This trip will be very special because one of my brothers and one of my sisters with their spouses will join us on the journey.
Yet, even as I ponder this “trimmed version” of my Bucket List with excitement and expectancy, the desire for a month-long visit on the island of Crete remains. I haven’t crossed it out! Maybe someday it will yet happen.
Crossing-out, erasing, eliminating is quite different from trimming back. Crossing out those things we dream of and hope for has a finality that just doesn’t feel good to me. Trim the dream, never cross it off!
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| Athens, Greece--1961 |
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