As I age, there are loads of things I want to do, but none are the kinds of bland, commodified ‘adventures’ that these lists imply
N
o, I don’t want to smoke a cigar in Havana. I don’t want to go hot-air ballooning in the Serengeti, nor skydive naked from a microlight plane in Costa Rica. I don’t have a bucket list. And I wish people would stop asking me if I do.
I’m 73 and the co-founder of a social enterprise, Advantages of Age, that challenges the media narrative around ageing. Recently I appeared on a podcast to discuss it. Of course, the host asked me what is on my bucket list. I was horrified. Strangely, for once, I didn’t offer a raft of invectives: I simply said I didn’t have one. But here’s what I really think: the bucket list has blandified adventure. And that is a sin in my book.
A bucket list reminds me in a horrible way of a consumer-led wedding list. And I never got married. Deliberately. It’s not that I don’t have loads of non-commodified, non-cuteified ideas for stuff I’d like to do – yes to another local dance; yes to gallivanting with my grandson and son. I’m a bit of an old hippy travel snob, so yes please to Senegal and Algiers, but you can keep Machu Picchu and soaring above the Grand Canyon in a helicopter. My interests are not part of an intentional pensioner experience. They’re just good fun that I happen to be having in my 70s.
