Part I: Where to Go?

As my twenty-fifth birthday was fast approaching, and with it the end of my flight benefits, it was certain I had to make one last trip.  I've been very lucky; the opportunity of flight benefits is something few get to have, and fortunately I'm restless and not just a little curious.

Ever since I've come to the age of venturing out alone in the unknown, I think I've made a good show of what my life has had to offer.  Those who've read the other hastily scribbled entries on this blog are well familiar.  This is the latest chapter and I promise not the last.  My passport to the sky may have expired, but boats are proving to be pretty affordable on this piece of the         world.  Hopefully next time I will be writing to you from ports with beard and tan, sails, shine, and all the free wind Aeolus may bless this hopeful selcouthist sailor.

It was a rainy day in Vancouver and I sat with two friends and asked: where should I go? We prattled around with several suggestions, but I felt the incessant tap of the little kid in me, reminding me once again of a promise I made to him.  That was long ago, and funny enough, that's where my bucket list started.

I find it a little strange that bucket lists only become really important when much of life has already been lived.  Especially considering we start so young in compiling such important lists.  Childhood is spent in the language of bucket lists.  We are constantly asked what we want to be when we grow up.  We constantly talk of the things we will do, things we would do if only we were older.  Remembering now, childhood is like recalling a dream.  And I wonder if that nebulous and painful line between adolescence and 'adulthood' is like waking up in the morning.  The buzz of the alarm clock is more present, the obligations of work and people more important than the dreams we wake from.  How simply and sad the dream of childhood is forgotten.  How willing we all are to procrastinate on the truly important things in life. 

Several years ago, I spent a good deal of energy seeking out people in the latter decades of their life and asking them respectfully what it was they regretted about their lives.  The answer is unanimous.  Almost no one regrets what they did; life happens - shit happens, you can't change it, but everyone wished they’d taken more chances, they regretted the things they didn't do.

I've pondered this in the years since –ponder it still- and I must say, it does quick work to cut through the bullshit that comes up in day-to-day life.  It also prompted me to write down my bucket list.  I figured, even if I don't do it all, at least it'll all exist in some form instead of just being all talk.  Lo and behold who pipes up first when the pen hits the paper but that kid I once was, a little boy who watched JAWS at an ungodly young age (thanks Grammy) and fell in love with white sharks.

I set my sights on Africa, for Safari and Cage-Diving.

I packed, got on a plane and went.