Never Will I Ever...

from Lexi Eddings...

Lots of people make Bucket Lists. They like to dream about the ultimate adventure, things that are "must do's" before they leave this planet. However, I'm leaning a different direction.

I have an Un-Bucket List. Here are 5 things I would NEVER do. See if you agree.

1. Run with the bulls. It's never a good idea to tease animals. They only have few ways to let you know they don't like it and none of them are good for you. Call me crazy, but there's a reason bulls are kept in sturdy pens. These are big, dangerous quadrupeds with pointy horns. Confine them in narrow streets with thousands of people screaming around them, then encourage them to chase you, and you've got a recipe for disaster on your hands. 12 people were gored just last summer at the San Fermin festival. If I wrote a character who tried something like this, they'd be TSTL (Too Stupid To Live).
   
2. Swim with the sharks. (See Run with the Bulls for an explanation of why it's unwise to tick off animals for sport) Of course, sharks don't have pointy horns. They have teeth. Bunches of them! In rows, for pity's sake! There are adventure dives offered that put you in a cage while surrounded by great whites. Are you kidding me? What has to break inside you to need that much adrenaline?
    

'Nuff said.

3. Watch the movie Titanic. (Surprised you with that one, didn't I? I heard your collective gasp.) I have never and will never watch this movie because I know how it ends. The boat sinks. No matter what happens before that, I know the story will not end well. (This tendency to reject unhappy endings has also caused me to send a Nicholas Sparks novel splatting against the nearest wall.)

4. Jump out of a perfectly good airplane. I'm not afraid of heights. I enjoy flying, especially in a small plane like a Cessna. My DH is a private pilot and we used to have a 182 which we flew all over the western US. We saw things no one else sees--a long scrape in the earth ending with a mound which we think must have been a meteorite, and once, a perfectly heart-shaped lake high in the Cascades with no roads leading in or out. I love small planes. But I don't enjoy the feeling of impending destruction. Why anyone would want to parachute out of one that is working properly escapes me completely.  

5. Stop reading. Since kindergarten I've been in love with the written word. It's been said that we read to know we are not alone. A life lived with only my own ideas, thoughts, and feelings bouncing around my head would be dreary indeed. Books turned into movies aren't the same. Any screen-based entertainment just sort of washes over me. 

But a book! I live it. Some of them become part of me forever. It's a private conversation between me and the author. I treasure that sort of deep sharing. If someday, God forbid, I lose my sight, I'll turn to books on tape.

OK, these are my "never will I ever's." What's on YOUR un-bucket list?