My husband has a very full “Bucket List.” Not a pie in the sky, lottery lusting, I think I might, kinda list. It’s an honest to gosh, come hell or high water, gonna do it list. He has places he wants to go, things he wants to do and goals he’s going to accomplish. He’s had this bucket for most of his life and from what I can see, it’s bottomless!

I didn’t even know I needed a bucket, until I met Terry and then he insisted I get one of my own. So now I have a bucket. Of course, that made me obligated to put something in it. I thought about it ad nauseam and then decided, I want to see the Northern Lights!

The only obstacle I can see is if I were to check it off my list, then I would be left with an empty bucket again. With that in mind, I’m not entirely sure I want to ever check it off. Besides, there is a serious issue that I need to take into consideration. Even if I plan it down to the precise moment, and bought the plane ticket to the highest points in Alaska or the Antarctic, I’d still not have a guarantee that the Aurora Borealis would show itself to me.

So, for the past, almost two decades Terry has grandfathered me into his bucket; because I go where he goes. I wasn’t aware that buckets could even have passengers, but I think I am one. Yes, I decided – I’m a “Bucket Passenger”!

I can’t figure out if being a passenger on someone’s else’s bucket is a bad thing or good one. I ask myself, “What kind of a moron doesn’t even have enough ambition to put something in her own bucket or at the very least come up with a second item?

On the other hand, maybe, just maybe I’ve got the right idea. I don’t have to make lists nor check them off. I have no pressure to accomplish them. I don’t have to worry about the planning, the money, the timing or the disappointment if I didn’t see it through. Which is typically my approach. I came to the conclusion that I really don’t need my own bucket; I’m a passenger, damn it, and a good one!!

Some things on Terry’s list don’t even interest me at all and others scare me to death, such as his desire to ride a Bobsled; which he has a reservation for in Salt Lake City this month. His list also consist of visiting every baseball park in America of which he’s already two-thirds of the way through, so there’s no reason to jump on that bandwagon.

Last week we climbed into Terry’s bucket and went to Key West. We were both enamored with the life of Ernest Hemingway and the descendants of his six-toed cats. We loved the lessons learned from the stories of Mel Fisher and his treasures of the sunken ship, Atocha. We drank our way through the Pilar Rum tasting factory, shared a piece of “The Original Key-Lime Pie” and visited Jimmy Buffet’s Margaritaville, just to say we did.

Lastly, and evidently on Terry’s list, we tripped all over ourselves to leave at the crack of dawn, to drive like a bat out of hell, just to get glimpse at the “African Queen as she sputtered up the canal at Key Largo. He checked it off his list!

On the long road back to Miami, I had plenty of time to think it through. Just because it was on his list, does that mean he had more fun than me?

Absolutely not!

I came to the conclusion that very day, that it’s so much better to be a passenger than to have your own bucket anyway! I’m going to recommend the sport of “Bucket Riding” to all my friends and add another elusive goal to my list…… enter a “Bucket Riding Contest”!