Dunkirk NY – A bucket list has been shaping up in my head these past few weeks. I think this is a positive development in terms of trying to shape a retirement future. Here’s what the list looks like at the moment in no particular order of importance:
- A book documenting the lives of ordinary, everyday actors. We are so caught up in the lives of famous people that I think it’s important to somehow document the lives and work of actors who populate the smaller regional theatres of the US. I don’t know whether this is a book, a web site, or a combination of both.
- A book outlining reforms for the university college curriculum in theatre. This is a project for which I’ve been gathering data for some time, and I think it might be the easiest project to start. There’s a lot of writing I’ve already done in past blogs that I think I can adapt that writing to this project.
- Hiking the Appalachian Trail, and while doing so record the hike in haibun form. I’ve been learning to write haiku, and I’ve become interested in haibun, which is a prose/poetry form that suits itself well to travelogue form. I don’t think anyone’s attempted such a form, so I am hoping it would be unique.
- Spending three months or so travelling around Europe. Basically, a sightseeing tour of all the famous cities and locations in Europe. I’d probably concentrate on cathedrals and architecture in general.
- Seeing a baseball game in every professional baseball stadium in Japan. The passion that the Japanese have for baseball is unsurpassed, and I’d like to soak that in.
- Attending a baseball game in every minor league park in the US. It goes without saying that I’d go to major league games as well, but I think that’s an overdone goal. If it happen, fine; but the accomplishment of seeing every minor league field is far more interesting and I think would take me to places in America I would not think of otherwise.
- Becoming more fluent in Spanish.
I think that’s it for now. If I come up with anything else I’ll edit the post and mark the update. There’s something about writing this down that makes it a bit more real. I know I won’t get everything on this list accomplished, so I will have to think about priorities. But it’s a pretty nice list as it stands.
The next step is figuring out some concrete actions to get them done. Money, of course, is an issue, as are travel logistics. Since retirement savings are so necessary to continue to support yourself in old age, I can’t afford to take what I’ve got and blow it on everything. Yet, some of these projects do carry monetary potential. How much monetary potential, I don’t know. I also don’t know how much other life factors will interfere with accomplishing any of this. But it’s good to have some plans, and writing down those plans is a good first step. It gets the information out of my head, and once they show up on a page there is then a certain level of commitment. Anyway, we shall see what transpires. -twl
I find the wintertime to be a time, not so much of considering the future, but evaluating the past. Right at this moment, in this retirement limbo, where the past is over and the future is uncertain, I find it difficult to be still. I would like to be still and listen; winter is a great time for stillness and listening. I catch myself staring out windows, surveying a landscape that is hauntingly monochromatic and strangely desolate. I listen to the wind, the sound of which gives me the chills. I can think of many things I might want to be doing, but they all require leaving the house and getting outside. I peruse web sites with newer RVs I’d love to trade for, and I glance furtively at temperatures in Arizona. I have the time to reflect on the whole of my past, since there is at the moment no immediate future that requires preparation. The pieces, as I perceive them, do not begin to add up in the way they used to.