Bucket Listing

  2 August, 2013,

   Summer is over.
   The slant of light has changed, the air is sweeter and the nights are cooling off. Now when I wake up I feel like it's time to get ready for school, not stay in bed and sleep until noon.
    This summer screamed by.
    It could be that I Accomplished A Thing by cleaning up the bathroom.
    It could be that Jim and I consciously started looking for things to do without the kids so that next year, when Genoa goes to college, we're not complete strangers.
    It could be that Genoa had an internship, the Betty Buckley workshop, a job.
    It could be that Harper had a babysitting job two days a week, occasionally split with her sister, and a boyfriend who takes her to dinner almost every night.
    These things combined with G having a car means the girls are doing their own thing instead of looking at me whining "Entertain Us" for the first time.
     It could be the lovely trip to Durango, our Saturday Ironworks dates, finishing design and crew manuals, actively looking for things to do, Jim's bucket list....
      Jim's Bucket List.
  
                                                    Mt. Bierstedt
    Jim has decided he needs to bucket list.  Yes, I verbed a noun, move on. I was not aware of this until he got all flavors of geeked out goofy over going to Mesa Verde. He pulled up maps and photos, trails and bought tickets to the two tour houses, regardless of his knees or weight, by god he was going. It was very cute. Finally he admitted "I've always wanted to do this!"
     I personally think 50 is a silly age to bucket list, but he didn't ask me.
    "Climb a Fourteener" is on his list.
    Well, any normal summer any other year I'd say "Have fun" and stay home with a cocktail and Drunk History. But this weird summer I said sure, I'll go up with you.
     Knowing I have cadaver ligaments in my knee, held together with fifteen year old screws, which have recently begun to grind like broken glass, I still said "sure, I'll go too" in the spirit of Let's Do Things Together.
     Jim almost made it to the summit. To his credit he trudged upward with impressive determination. He turned back only when black clouds began to roll in. Being struck by lightning while achieving a Bucket List item was not on his Bucket List.
     I, on the other hand, turned back much sooner. About an hour into the hike, to be exact. There is a ridge of rock facings that are, in places, a foot apart. It's a strain to climb, my knee did not love it, but that was not my issue. My issue was looking straight up and thinking "there is no way I'm coming back down". Grinding knees have a tendancy, under duress, to give out. So I turned back. As I interviewed many people at the base who were returning from the summit, I learned that I had made the right choice, that it gets worse with a trail of bolders further up. Which are not an issue if you A) have working knees or are B) a mountain goat.
      We miscalculated the time as well. People we asked who had climbed seem to think it was a two hour up, two hour down venture. A few at the base that I interveiwed said the same.  So when Jim did not return by 1pm I began to get jumpy.
       I learned later in my interviews that that climb up is two hours if you are A) twenty years old and in good shape or B) a mountain goat. The people returning did not meet either of those requirements and said it was definitely a six hour round trip, particularly when you get to the top and hang out for a bit. This was confirmed by a Ranger I talked to, who shook his head and said "This always happens, it is not short and it is not 'easy'."
       So as I waited for four hours at the base, walking from the truck to the trail head to the bathroom to the truck to the trailhead, down the trail to the lake, back up, sit on the wood railing, look at the map, back to the truck, to the bathroom, to the trail head, down to the lake...and chatted with those returning about how long it had taken them and, by the way, did you see a guy who looked like my husband...I made my own list.
       Or at least I started one.
       At 47 I do not feel the need for a Bucket List. I may never feel  a need for such a thing because I really don't want to do anything but theatre and drink and watch TV. I have already accomplished these things, I'm good. 
        So I, instead, have a Things I Have No Desire To Do, Ever list.
        At present it has only three items:
        #1 Hike a fourteener.
        #2 Swim with sharks.
        #3 See CATS.