#bucketlistthings

A bucket list:”A number of experiences or achievements that a person hopes to have or accomplish during their lifetime.”

Example:”Making this trip the first thing on my bucket list.”

Adventure:”An unusual and exciting, typically hazardous, experience or activity” or as others would say, “engaging in hazardous and exciting activity, especially the exploration of unknown territory.”

Me:”Name one thing on your bucket list.”

Stranger:”Skydiving. No wait, going to see the Eiffel tower.”

Noun: A person, place or thing.

A bucket list: A thing.

Adventure: A thing.

Her: A person.

Her: An unknown territory.

Stranger: “Name one thing on your bucket list.”

           I always kind of pictured her as quiet. Still. Calm. Sitting there, on the couch, brown curls down past her shoulders while she smiled up at me with her big brown eyes. I always kind of pictured her as warm. Comfortable. Caring. Pulling me in after a bad day of work with chinese take out ready for me at the table for whenever she decided to let go. I always kind of pictured her as beautiful. Stunning. Brilliant. As the light struck her face outside on the lawn while we were waiting for the kids to get off the school bus. I always kind of pictured her as free. Sovereign. Limitless. The kind of person strangers stop to look at because she had that glow about her. I always kind of pictured her. Kind of. 

Stranger: “Name one thing on your bucket list.”

            I always kind of pictured her as patient. Gentle. Kind. The type that would reach over after my fourth time trying to find directions to Maine. The type that would smile, reach over and kiss me; as she pulls up a map on the first try. I always kind of pictured her as sociable. Cordial. Conversable. The one I could leave with my family over appetizers on Christmas Eve while I ran home to get the sweater I forgot to bring for Beth this year. The one where when I come back, she’s sitting there with my second cousin on her lap, reading him a bedtime story as he falls asleep while she pulls him in closer so he won’t fall down. I always kind of pictured her. Kind of. 

Stranger: “Name one thing on your bucket list.”

             I always kind of pictured her as funny. Whimsical. Priceless. Where we’re out at some type of 5 star restaurant and she cracks a joke that makes me shoot water out of my nose, mouth and any other hole in my face and then laughs with me as the waiter comes over and tells us that it is time for us to leave. I always kind of pictured her as thrill seeking. Bold. Venturesome. Where the do not enter sign does not apply to her as she climbs on top of the highly built chain fence, chuckles when she sees my “what if” face and reaches her hand down to pull me up after her. I always kind of pictured her as sharp. Wise. Intelligent. Where I listen to her take a home phone call in the middle of our movie because someone from her job can’t figure out what I know will only take her a matter of seconds to fix. I always kind of pictured her. Kind of. 

Stranger: “Name one thing on your bucket list.”

              I picture her just as I always see her, flawless. Unmarred. Impeccable. The kind of beauty where it does not matter if she’s in a two day old t-shirt with her hair tied and her glasses on. I picture her as breathtaking. Wondrous. Intoxicating. The kind of girl that makes you drop your pencil in math class or stop breathing altogether when you breathe her in because you can’t figure out how that nose, and those lips, and that smile and those eyes could all possibly be put into one face; into one person. I picture her as fascinating. Captivating. Magnetic. The way her forehead wrinkles when she’s thinking one of her many thoughts or the way her letters form a stream of words that form sentences that form poems; even if all she is simply saying is that two plus two equals four. 

Stranger: “Name one thing on your bucket list.”

               I picture her as art. The way her cheeks stain the kind of red you can’t mix together on a pallet because that shade of red belongs to her, and only to her. The way her eyes tell stories without using words, she’s Michelangelo. I picture her as limitless. The way she knows exactly what she wants and will not take no as an answer; she makes red lights light up green. I picture her as everlasting. The type of soul you know is timeless, endless, eternal. The way that you know her smile could light a broken light bulb. The way you know her silent laugh can be heard at the ends of the earth. The way you know her journey is just beginning, and that it is going to be one that even the most esteemed of authors could not touch, because she is in charge of writing her own book. My love for her is everlasting. 

Stranger: “Name one thing on your bucket list.”