Creating my ‘Bucket Hole List’
Johnny’s Issues
There is so much talk about “bucket lists” lately that one might get the impression the baby boomers are scared to death about death. Or maybe they are somewhat concerned about living life to the fullest before they finally kick their own bucket. Well, ever one to buck a trend, I like to consider that there is a hole in my bucket, and I am happy to allow some things to fall through that hole. These are things I will not strive to achieve before I die and so they make it onto what I call my “Bucket Hole List.”
My main objective is to empty my bucket of anything that might hasten the need for a bucket list in the first place. Let’s start with jumping out of an airplane- skydiving. President George H. W. Bush went skydiving when he turned ninety years old. Good for him! And nope, that will not be happening with me. The thought of having an “emergency chute” is all that is needed to add that activity to my Bucket Hole List. Don’t get me started with gravity.
The same thing is true with mountain climbing. When I think about it, I might be okay with climbing UP a mountain. It is the trip DOWN that has me concerned. Again, that whole gravity thing. No, it is safe to say that when it comes to my visiting any mountain: “I came. I saw. I took a great video and then had a terrific lunch at a restaurant nearby.”
Further on this Bucket Hole List, I will not own a boat [I’d sink it], motorcycle [obviously], or take flying lessons [ever run out of gas in your car? Yeah, me too]. To quote the Clint Eastwood character Dirty Harry, “A man’s got to know his limitations.” Well I do, Clint. Thank you for pointing that out.
Another thing I would allow onto my Bucket Hole List: big game hunting in Africa. In the first place, I couldn’t shoot a lion. And in the second place, there are all the inoculations that are needed just to avoid catching malaria and the like. Give me Europe in a four-star hotel and that will do just fine.
Last but not least on this Bucket Hole List is to get a tattoo. For me, this holds no appeal whatsoever. Maybe it’s just the permanence of it all. It reminds me of wearing the same socks every day, day after day for the rest of my life. So, no.
Once, as a joke, I had a henna tattoo put on my arm just before I was to attend a formal event. Henna is a type of temporary tattoo and I think it said “Born to be Wild” or something like that. I had placed it on my wrist so that it was just barely visible when wearing a suit. I had some real fun with that and for a short time I had some folks believing that my tattoo was real. I told them it was part of my “wild” youth.
Interestingly, henna ink historically was used to create body art on the African continent. I wonder if anyone there ever tattooed the phrase “Born to be Wild” somewhere discrete?
Johnny McNally is Grimes County’s Best Dressed Businessman advocating for Grimes County.