My Bucket List

Thanksgiving is a time for reflection, renewal, and rejoicing. In that spirit, I’ve made a bucket list and combined two facets of my life, emotional and physical, into this list.

• Make a positive impact in someone’s life.
• Try always being optimistic (which is hard at times).
• Develop whatever talent God gave me.
• Treat people with respect and dignity.
• Enjoy my life.
• Visit Jerusalem and the pyramids of Egypt (yeah, like that’s gonna happen.)
• Go back to New York City.
• See the Gettysburg battlefield.
• Ride in a carriage and a streetcar in New Orleans.
• Meet Robert Duvall and Billy Bob Thornton.
• Have an experience with a ghost (preferably an affable spirit)
• Be remembered when I die.

Those are just a few that came to me, there’s many more! We all need a bucket list. Yet, of all the things I haven’t done, here are some awesome things I HAVE experienced (including having a picture made with some fabulous writers):

• Spent seven years in the Army, right out of high school.
• Coached kids in basketball for almost ten years.
• Saw the international space station fly over earth.
• Wore a Superbowl ring on my finger.
• Witnessed both a Broadway play, and an off-Broadway play.
• Donated blood, with my mom, for Lifeshare on Mother’s Day one year.
• Corresponded with producers of Rocky Balboa, The Stand, & Crocodile Dundee.
• Had one of my screenplays compared to Mel Brooks.
• Met Lois Smith who, as a young person, appeared in East of Eden with James Dean.
• Participated in a poetry reading.
• Spoke to students, and adults, on creative writing.
• Knew one of my great-grandfathers, and one of my great-grandmothers.
• Walked in the footsteps of slaves at plantations throughout Louisiana.
• Captured two ghosts, or something unexplainable, in photographs.

Naturally, the accomplished list is much longer too.  The point is, of all the things I haven’t done, there are some really cool things I have done.  Adding to the cool list is meeting and having my photo taken with the award-winning writers Tony Kushner and Mark Harris! (I wanted them to squeeze me until I exploded!) What about you? Make your own list. It may surprise you!