Everybody pretends that you die only once. But that’s not true. You can die a thousand possible futures in the course of a single, stupid life.

– Kate Bowler in “One thing I don’t plan to do before I die is make a bucket list“

I will admit it. I have always kept bucket lists. I have mostly couched them as “Before I am XX years old …” declarations of goals and ambition, but when you kick their tires, they are bucket lists. The older I get, I realize we actually do die a thousand possible futures in the course of a single, stupid life. When you think about lists, bucket or otherwise, they are all driven by a sense of, what Bowler calls “finitude.” A thought we will, at some point, achieve “doneness.” (The ultimate “doneness” being death.) Writing this, I have both never been “done” and absolutely “done” a thousand times. I have achieved goals. I have quit. I have had relationships thrive. I have had relationships end. I have excelled in jobs. I have failed in jobs. I have told the truth. I have lied. I have started writing in planners and journals. I have had planners and journals wither from lack of attention, like plants that die when you don’t water them. (I have had that happen, too.)

I live in the state of tension between someone who sets a goal and achieves it — and — someone who fails miserably over and over and struggles to maintain hope. Let me explain. I love that I am, generally, a finisher of things. I want to remain a curious, faithfilled, seeker and risk taker. But, I don’t want my failures to wear me down to the point where I am tired and simply stop believing in myself or anything.

I started keeping lists when I was diagnosed with Turner syndrome in high school. That diagnosis changed my life. It was my first possible future death. It came at a point in my life of perceived, absolute, naive invincibility. I remember thinking, if I can’t [fill in the blank with something huge like have children, or live a long life because my aorta will fatally dilate] than I will have to [fill in the blank with something huge like international travel as soon as I can scare up the money, or get a PhD]. I have perfected the art of escaping the present by working on the next thing over the years. That is the paradox of bucket lists. They both engage us in finding meaning in life, while also making meaning an impossible quest. They create a cycle of “doneness” akin to a hamster wheel. They allow happiness to always remain one accomplishment/goal/item out of our grasp. All that being said, I will continue to make lists, and revel in the as if and not yet of my “doneness.”