Bucket lists are fun because they’re unrealistic at times, leaving us with the gift of true intention with no pressure of actually having to do the work. A trip to Iceland is on my bucket list, for example, but I am not expected to purchase tickets and plan my chilly, raw venture. Also, adding alpacas to my beautifully wild and lively family is on my bucket list, but I have not started building the barn, and nobody is calling me out on it.
I have an ever-evolving rusty bucket list that is not on cheap white paper in leaky blue ink, nor does it take up multiple bytes in an electronic document. Bucket lists are possible, though, so you have to remain within some parameters. You can’t say, for example, I want to take a time machine to 1955 or walk dogs with Billie Holiday. Either way, it’s fun to play the game, but not as much fun as it is to declare your items on a wish list.
A wish list includes events and items such as winning the lottery or meeting Jimmy Fallon; it won’t happen, but it’s fun to dream, to wish. There’s actually less effort to a wish list, no pressure inasmuch as it’s either a product of happenstance or literally impossible.
I do have a wish, to one day see a North Carolina red wolf in the wild. They are here in NC, and I have recently started following a photographer who captures the canines doing their thing not too far from my bed, from my front porch, and I’m obsessed.
Walt Jenkins is a criminal defense attorney from Pinehurst, NC, who takes photos of the red wolves in NC. I follow him on Facebook and sometimes use his photos to fall asleep at night after a midnight wake-up. I won’t share the photos on my blog because they are not my property, but I do hope you will maybe CLICK HERE and look at some of his shots.
When I see his photos, I feel them in my chest. They make me feel. They represent, to me, what mundane non-importance truly is, like laundry, dog hair on the floor, and new gray hair at my temples. I hope you have something that grants your insides a little zap, a spark, one that recenters you, one that you seek out.
*If you CLICK HERE you can see some photos of red wolves and learn more about their habitat, history, and endangerment.
Teresa Forester Adams 