Why wait until death is just around the corner before embarking on all the cool stuff you’ve always wanted to do?
Why not do it now?
I mean, why wouldn’t you carry out your so called ‘bucket list’ while you’re still able-bodied and healthy, while you can still appreciate the greatness of the feat for years to come; while the people you hope to include in this activity are still alive and able to appreciate the greatness of it also?
April 2007 I underwent the death of my dearest friend.
Although I was devastated by a gargantuan sense of loss – for me but especially for his family – that was almost mitigated by the fact that I knew he regretted nothing. This man had lived his life according to a resounding cliché – as if each day were his last. Similarly, I felt no regret on his behalf – him and I had shared countless great moments and never held anything back from one another – if it needed saying it was said, if it needed doing it was done and done properly.
The point here is that in the days following this great man’s death, there was one line which was uttered with such frequency that it reverberated inside my skull for weeks to come: “Oh, there was so much I wanted to tell him…”
On hearing this mawkishly hackneyed quote for what must have been the 32nd time in just a couple of days, honestly, I felt I was going to explode. It was all I could do to stop myself from confronting the speaker, gripping them by their quivering shoulders, shaking them by their forlorn bodies, slapping them across their woeful faces and screaming into their bloodshot eyes, “Well why the bloody hell did you wait?!”
Given that outbursts of this nature are not considered proper funeral decorum, I was forced to bite my tongue.
The point remains: why do we wait until it’s too late?
Article by Tim Walker
Edited by Rip Deano
Photography by Dean Jared Carroll