Someday Is Now

 

Everyone has a list.  It might be a physical list, but some of us only keep a mental one tucked far back in the brain.  And every once in a while, we drag it out of hiding and examine it. It's the Someday list.  Others might call it the Bucket List (good movie by the way...).  It is a comprehensive list of all the things we mean to do someday.

Someday...

Someday, I will have a workspace of my own.  

Someday, I will learn to make real fudge from scratch the way grandmother did on the top of the stove.

Someday, I will travel to ____________ (fill in the blank).

Someday, I will find the perfect haircut.

Someday, I will drive every road and see every tiny little town in the state of Georgia.

Someday, when I'm headed somewhere for vacation, I will stop at every roadside attraction that sounds the least bit worthwhile.

Someday, I will get a degree in something.

Someday, I will be a singer.  

Someday, I will learn to dance.

Someday, I want to skydive, ski, rock climb, hike the Appalachian Trail, lift weights.

Someday, I want to see the coastline of the entire United States.

Someday, I want to learn to make my own croissants.

Someday, I will have a pretty yard with lovely landscaping and flowers.

Someday...

The most elusive day ever imagined.  It never seems to be Someday. 

A few years ago, I realized that my someday list was extremely dated.  I'd literally ignored the fact that some of my dreams had very real expiration dates and those dates were long past.  I was too tied by responsibilities, too old, too tired, too broke, too aware of dangers where adventures once beckoned me to come.  

I destroyed my someday list, one that I'd kept tucked in my journals for years.  It all seemed so pointless.  

Dreams looked like fragments of broken glass waiting to cut and maim me.  I sternly steered myself away from all of the lovely rainbow-colored pieces on the ground and told myself that I could live just as well without dreams...But I didn't.  

John never let go of his dreams.  No matter that time might have passed and he was 50 years older than the things he'd once dreamed.  He held on to them, anyway.  I admired his tenacity even as I scoffed a little at some of his dreams.  

One day, when we were talking about his dreams, he turned to me suddenly and asked, 'What do you dream of?'  I said stonily, "I don't dream.  What's the point?  Somedays never come!"  He looked shocked.  Puzzled.  Concerned.  I shrugged my shoulders and said, "That's just the way it is!"  

So last year when summer came along and I began to tentatively recall things I'd once wanted to do, places I wanted to see, things I used to enjoy doing and had let fall away.  I began to take them up once more, to talk to John about them. I could see he was pleased.  He encouraged me all the way.  In everything.  No matter how outlandish my Someday statements were.

This year, in light of his death, in dealing with so many things that I had need to deal with, that I knew I 'ought to' do, I found myself recalling some of his last words to me.  "Go on a trip, a real one..." he said. "Don't let anyone stop you.  Don't let anyone walk over you."  "Do things!"  Encouraging to the last, he made me aware that Someday had risen on the horizon of my life, even though it had set on his.  

All of the need to and ought to tasks are done.  I'm ready to begin living like it's Someday.  I want to begin by taking little trips here within my own state, all on my own.  I am looking at and researching different areas.  I'm thinking day trips, or one-night trips at first.  It's unpleasantly warm in Georgia just now, not the best season for walking about sightseeing.  But have air-conditioned car, I will travel a little.  I will see the places I've longed to visit.  I'll tackle a few other things on my list as well.  

Someday has finally arrived.