The anti-bucket list (from two years ago) Things I don't want to learn...

I've got a long, long list of things I want to learn. But I've noticed recently, the list is shifting. I've begun thinking it's ok if I don't learn that. or that. or that. I don't have to know how to do everything.

Things I no longer care to learn:

How to follow a pattern. Darts and folds and all of that. (shudder -- I'm right back in 7th grade home-ECK). I'll sew what looks like it goes together. Then see what I've got.

I don't need to know how to play piano. My Dad played. His dad did some work for a fellow and the fellow traded piano lessons for whichever one of Grandpa's kids wanted to learn. And that turned out to be Dad. He played classical. But piano is off my list.

I don't need to learn how to wear make-up. I'm 55 --(note: 58 this year) and got along ok without it so far. I haven't scared anyone into a heart-attack yet with my looks. Not quite.

I don't know which wine glass is the right one for which wine. That's ok. I can't Salsa. I don't know how to do that. Contra dancing, either. They might be the same thing for all I know. I don't care. I don't know very much about politics. It's ok. My kids know and they tell me enough so I know who to vote for and why and I'm cool with that. I don't know how to twitter. I know, now, that I'm not going to learn to drive a standard. That was a major, but I've dropped it now. ( I still have "drive" on my list, though. I still want that.) I'm no longer trying to learn German, Gaelic, or Spanish. I probably will not learn ballroom dancing. I probably will not learn to play a digeridoo (at least, not very well).

I will not learn woodworking, probably won't carve anything, and may not take a class in pottery. I'm not going to become a brick mason. Dad was and my brothers learned how, but I'm ok that I didn't learn. I'm never going to learn to ride a horse beyond the very basics (hold tight, don't squeal) or drive a horse-drawn wagon. Cool as that would be, I've decided to get that off my list of daydreams. I'm no longer interested in screenwriting. I will never downhill ski (though cross country is still a major wish).

I no longer plan to learn Feng Shui. I no longer want to open a bookstore. I'm not moving back to my Hometown (again)Note: We actually bought back the old homeplace last year. I don't plan to learn to appreciate baseball (or basketball or football or hockey or soccer). I do not intend to move into the wilderness alone and live in a bus. I am not going to hunt a deer, make jerky out of it and tan the hide and make a drum out of that. I most likely am also not going to make maple syrup, even though I sat in the Youngstown public library in 1972 and laboriously copied the directions of how to do it (you tap the trees after a freeze, during a thaw, and it takes 60 gallons of sap to make a gallon of syrup -- if it boils over, add butter). Plus, I love the song and am glad it was dedicated to Pete and Toshi. I'm not going to learn to write in the Cherokee language.

I am not going to woodburn with sunlight, using two magnifying glasses (and wearing protective eyewear so i won't go blind). I'm not going to become a homeopathic doctor (in spite of how hard I studied a mere 15 years ago). I'm not going to become a 3rd degree Wiccan or a Wiccan Priestess (I'm a simple hill granny). I'm never going to go back to college to get my degree. (I argue too much with the professors). I'm not going to get dredlocks. I'm not going to dye my hair red. I'm not going to sign up for wilderness school, taught by Tom Brown, Jr.

I'm not going to go west.

I'm not going to become an archiologist. I'm not going to become a Reiki master.I'm not going to live in a commune. I'm not going to walk the Appalachian trail. Nor am I going to bike across America. In that same vein, I am not going to get a job, earn enough to get me to the next town, get another job to get money to get me to the next town... and so on. I'm not going to drive a motorcycle. I'm not going down the rapids in a raft. I'm not going up in a balloon. I am not taking that long, long train ride where I look out the window and imagine I lived a hundred years ago. I know this now.

All these things -- and others I'll remember about the time I've stopped writing this post -- are things I once wanted to do, but realize I really don't care to do them now.

My list of things I want to do is still long, but for the most part I'm already doing them or have done them and I simply want to go back to do those things again -- raise milk goats, spin wool (which Honey will weave), read runes and tarot and write books and work with astrology and make my own medicines and work with magic. I want a house in the country where my kids can come when they need to hear the wind in the trees and I want to run a hostel in the city and go dance to the drums on Friday night, go to Improv and maybe even join in, and rejoin the Storytellers again and travel to the Pagan gatherings... I want to take bellydancing lessons and learn yoga.

And go camping again by the river up near Richwood and go skinny dipping again in the middle of the night when the river is a mirror of moon and stars and the water is cold as melted snow. And then wrap in a blanket and sit by the fire and play the drum into the creation of a road ahead of me going on and on and on....