A Bucket List is a list of things you’d like to do before you die – ie. before you kick the bucket.  A lot of people have lists – some keep them just in their head, others have them written down and there are countless numbers of websites that let you curate a list on their site and offer suggestions of things you should add to your list.

I did have a list written down at some point – I started it when I was in college and it mostly consisted of meeting band members (many of which I have now met).  I used a few websites to try and curate lists but never really stuck to using them very long.  Right now it’s kind of just in my head. It’s long. It’s constantly changing.

Recently though, I’ve been wondering if you can cross items off of this “list” if they weren’t really on the list to begin with?  There are a couple of things that happened to me in the past few months that I would say were items that were bucket list worthy – but weren’t actually on my list. Can I add them and quickly cross them off? If it’s my list – then do I get to make (and break) the rules?

In September while at Disney World we ended up riding The Haunted Mansion with Hanson.  Now while ‘ride an amusement park ride with Hanson’ wasn’t technically on my bucket list – it WAS something I used to think a lot about when I was in my early teens. I used to run a Hanson e-mail newsletter and I remember once posing the question – if you were at an amusement park and Hanson was there – would you buy their ride photo if you saw it available?  I think it shows that somewhere deep down inside I had always hoped to be at a park when Hanson was there – and so I got my wish. Cross it off the list!   (Even better was the fact that we had seen photos of the band at Hollywood Studios that same day and we didn’t think they’d bother park hopping so it made it all the more exciting when we did spot them coming off the ride right after us!)

Another was in January – when I got my photo taken with Coco the monkey. I have always loved monkeys, I think almost anyone that knew me in high school knows this to be true. So when I found out there was a monkey taking photos I was so excited I started singing songs about it.  (I think I ended up with 3 different songs – none of which I can remember now, of course.) But again, specifically, ‘get a photo with a monkey’ was something that I never thought to put on my bucket list. I’m actually not sure anything related to monkeys was ever on the list or even a thought of being on the list.

Crossing things off a bucket list that were never on there to begin with seems to be just as exciting as crossing off items that really are on the list, to me anyway.

Do you have a bucket list? Do you find yourself adding things to it after you’ve already experienced them?

If you don’t have a bucket list – why not? If you’ve just not gotten around to making one – what would be something you’d have on yours?