"Bucket List" is a term copped from a really bad film released in 2007 that starred Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman. The term means doing all the things you want to do before you "kick the bucket." Its a glorified wish list that's designed to: 1) inspire you to live a more fulfilling life or 2) make you feel completely inadequate. I lean towards number two.
I was at a lunch when somebody asked everybody at the table to share one thing on their "bucket list." I cringed inside and hoped they wouldn't get to me...
Most everybody had some pretty simple wishes - visit all the baseball parks in the U.S., go to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City, jump out of a plane, etc. When I heard these, I realized that I didn't have a "bucket list" at all - nothing grand or extravagant. I was embarrassed by my lack of wishes.
It seems to me that people who spout their "bucket list" wishes are doing a kind of intellectual showing off, trying to one-up their peers by the outrageousness of their lists. As if a crazy "bucket list" indicates some kind of creative superiority over everybody else.
They got to me and I flat out said I don't have a "bucket list." People feigned shock at my lack of response. But I couldn't just make something up - that wouldn't be true.
In the weeks since that lunch, I gave "bucket listing" a long hard think. And I came up with one bucket item.
And that's to stop going to lunches where people insist on sharing their "bucket lists."
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