What is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

This is a chance to rethink your life and re-vision what you want the rest of it to look like.

Maybe you've seen the movie Bucket List. Don't worry if you haven't--it's not that good. But the point of it was worth talking about: what do you want to accomplish in this short life of yours? Or in the words of the poet Mary Oliver, "Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?"

This week I was reminded again of making a "bucket list" by an article in Esquire. Sure, the list had a lot of crazy things on it and some that didn't interest me in the least, but it got me thinking about my own again. For starters, I don't want some random number of things to do, like 50 or 75. My list needs to have 104 things because that is how long I intend to live. (It's a long story) Also, since it is such a long list I decided it's ok to pad the first 37---that's how old I am--with things I've already done. Besides helping me reach 104, it's also serving to remind me of what I've already seen and accomplished.

However you choose to make your list, just make it. You don't have to show anyone. You may choose to show everyone. It may be 8 items or 80. The point is: do it. Make the list. Remind yourself why you get up and continue to get up each day. It may just be fun, and it may just show you a thing or two about yourself.

Oh, and in case you're wondering, here are my first 37.

Matt

1. Be the "best man" (twice)
2. Have child named after me (twice)
3. Jet ski on the Gulf of Mexico
4. Camp outside in the winter (-80 windchill)
5. Write and publish a book (Butterfly Teardrops)
6. Be a radio DJ (KFSI 1990-1995)
7. Own a Jeep Wrangler and drive it top down, doors off (twice)
8. Kill, dress, and eat a deer
9. Visit Jim Morrison's grave
10. Drink and be drunk on Bourbon Street in New Orleans
11. Open and close a butterfly knife the correct way
12. Snorkel on a coral reef
13. Be a carnival worker (for a week)
14. Graduate from a 4-year college (B.S. 1996)
15. Own and drive a motorcycle (1990-1995)
16. Teach my little sister how to drive a stick shift car (1991)
17. Dance with my grandmother at my wedding (1992)
18. See the Northern Lights dance across the sky
19. Live on an Indian Reservation
20. Backpack across Italy for two weeks
21. Visit the Louvre
22. Visit the Van Gogh Museum
23. Visit the Anne Frank house (secret annex)
24. Take college class with my mother
25. Buy a house
26. Mow lawn with my grandfather using reel mowers
27. Build pinewood derby car with father and win all-city
28. See Niagara Falls in summer
29. Visit MLK's birthplace and church
30. Attend centennial Olympic Games
31. Run a 5k and not come in last
32. Meet founder of world famous Wall Drug
33. Tour the White House (twice)
34. Train with military and police and pass firearms qualification test
35. Sleep under the stars without tent and listen to coyotes howl in the Whitewater valley
36. Have article and photos published in The Onion
37. Hear Santana play live

Now is the time for change

My first teaching job was on the Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe Reservation. When I arrived in late August they told me that the high school was brand new. Almost as quickly they reported that they had built one earlier in the year but that because of improper construction, it had fallen down almost immediately. Thankfully no one was hurt.

More recently the I-35 bridge in Minneapolis collapsed. This time the human toll wasn't so fortunate. 13 died, 145 were injured. People grieved, turned angry, turned to the courts. And rightfully so. It was known as early as 1990 that the bridge was structurally deficient. So are 75,000 other bridges.

You get what you pay for.

It seemed quite obvious in the time immediately after the bridge disaster that more attention--and money--is needed to build our nation's infrastructure. For some it seemed to strengthen their resolve that we should invest in building at home, not destruction abroad. And it took 13 lives wasted to make the point.

For less than $10 you can stuff yourself at a buffet within five minutes of my house. You can go by yourself, go back for "seconds" as many times as you like, and most likely no one will even look at you twice. Or for $10 you can have a slice of vegetarian lasagna and small salad at the local co-op.

You get what you pay for.

What exactly do we get for the cheap food in this country? Well, we now have about the same amount of people dying from food and non-activity related illnesses as we do from smoking (about 400,000 per year). We get diabetes and obesity. We get farm animals raised in such a manner that if your neighbor treated his dog like that you would call the police. We get a ton of chemicals added to our soils and waters. We get what we pay for.

The election may be over (well, not counting the Minnesota senate), but now is the time to vote for real: with our money.

"But I can't afford to eat organic."

"It costs too much to eat meat that isn't treated cruelly."

"Does it really make any difference?"

Now is the time to stop the excuses. Now is the time to do what you know is right. Stop whining and just get on with it. You get what you pay for, and if you continue to support cheap, fast, non-nutritious, non-sustainable, non-ethical food, your body and our environment will pay.