My Mighty Life List

Dear No One in Particular,

If you've spent any time on the interwebs at all, you've no doubt come across bloggers' life lists. Alternatively, you might remember a quirky, more-than-slightly-morbid film about two geriatrics on a road trip crossing items of a wish list.
I blame this trend on blogger extraordinaire Maggie Mason of Mighty Girl fame.

I'm a sucker for projects like these, especially since I've finally accepted the fact that I'm a Grownup and it's up to me to make my life as mighty wicked as I wish it to be.

I've been working on this list on-and-off for months now, and it's in no way a final draft. Part of constructing these lists is giving up a bit of control, shifting priorities, and learning to love whatever life throws at you.
The list is dominated by travel and food goals, which makes sense. My life comes down to two questions: where did you go and what did you eat? Other goals are long-term -- I won't know I've attained them until I'm old and grey. And a lot -- I mean a lot -- of these goals have a story behind them: wine and cheese parties, Bernadette Peters, the Showgirls deluxe DVD set. I can't wait to tell their stories and tell the story of how I made that dream come true.

The world is a treasure chest, my darlings. What gems do you seek before your time comes?

Amanda's Mighty Life List:

• Go to Australia. Stay for as long as necessary.
• Visit Olduvai Gorge and root around in the dirt
• Visit Patagonia; see penguins up close and personal
• Climb the Great Wall of China
• Eat offal
• Kiss the Boy under Juliet’s balcony in Verona, Italy
• Explore every Smithsonian Museum in DC
• Visit Dollywood; stalk/meet Dolly Parton
• Swim with bioluminescent plankton in Isla de Vieques, Puerto Rico
• Partake of entirely legal recreational drugs in Amsterdam
• See a shadow play in Thailand
• Eat stinky tofu in Taiwan
• Go dog sledding in Alaska
• Drive across the United States
• Become entirely fluent in Spanish
• Make wine and cheese parties a weekly tradition
• Eliminate financial worries
• Live a life with no regrets
• Dance underneath the Golden Gate Bridge
• Dinner at the French Laundry
• See Bernadette Peters in concert
• Rescue all future pets
• Create the perfect lemon square recipe
• Open The Nifty Bakeshop (aka: open my very own bakery)
• Pick berries and apples and make pies with the harvested goods (related: get over fear of making pie crust)
• Visit the catacombs of Europe
• Celebrate El Dia de los Muertos in Oaxaca, Mexico
• Visit Gobekli Tepe, Turkey (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1157784/Do-mysterious-stones-mark-site-Garden-Eden.html)
• Sit in a café in Prague; ponder deep, existential, pretentious thoughts
• Give the Showgirls Special Edition DVD set to a girlfriend as a baby shower present
• Do a NYT crossword in pen

• Write a story worthy of This American Life
• Get Carl Kasell to do the recording on my voicemail
• Read more
• Have a greener lifestyle
• Wear matching undergarments every day
• Shop the Witches’ Market in La Paz, Bolivia
• Live in a foreign country
• Eat durian in Indonesia
• Pull an all-nighter in Ibiza
• Always have fresh flowers in my home
• Learn to drive a stick shift
• Can my own jam
• Pick up the bridge toll for the car behind me
• Go vegan for a week
• Eat dulce de leche and steak (not together) in Argentina
• Exercise regularly
• Grow my own fruit trees
• Ride a donkey in the Grand Canyon
• Make my own salted caramel chocolate truffles
• Bowl a 300 game
• Win a National Geographic photography contest
• Ride a bike through a vineyard
• Make pistachio macarons that rival -- nay, surpass -- Miette’s
• Give $100 to a talented street musician
• Hug a baby bonobo
• Visit the Valley of the Kings
• Give thanks for all I have and all I have done every day