Things to do before I'm forty (or beyond)

[lethargic_man]

I've still got a little way to go before I'm forty, but with another birthday looming on the horizon, I've been giving a little thought to how I can enliven the dull routine of my life from time to time whilst I am still capable of it (and can afford it—which will probably be less the case if I ever get to raising a family). So I had a google for "things to do before you're forty", and browsed several lists (both of things to do and things done) for the most interesting suggestions which I hadn't already done, and which appealed to me; and then added some other things which occurred to me by myself.

• I was amused to see hot air ballooning appearing on multiple lists. My longer-term readers may recall I already suggested this a couple of years ago, but couldn't get anyone prepared to join in, on cost grounds. Last year when my parents asked what I wanted for my birthday, I said to go hot-air ballooning with aviva_m, but for a variety of reasons it didn't end up happening. I'm determined it will this year, though. After all, it's now officially a birthday present, not just an idea for a day out.
• See the Northern Lights. I'm jealous of North Americans, who can see these at much lower latitudes than here in Europe. I'm also annoyed that I didn't make more of an effort to see them during the four years when I was living in Edinburgh and working on a campus where half the sky was mostly clear of urban glow. (This would probably have involved consulting astronomical websites and spending lots of time sitting bored watching the sky; that's why it didn't happen.)
• Continuing the astronomical theme, see a total eclipse of the sun. I spent twenty years waiting for the last total solar eclipse to hit Britain—seriously, the date 11 August 1999 was branded onto my heart almost since the 1970s—and when it came, it was clouded over where I was (just outside Strasbourg), and I got to see nothing at totality bar the sight of dawn racing from horizon to zenith in a matter of seconds afterwards. I can't actually manage this before I'm forty, but what possibilities are there within a few thousand miles of here in the next few years? Well (unless I want to to go to Kenya), there'll be one on 20 March 2015 visible from the Faroe Islands, which I've been vaguely interested in visiting since reading Tim Severin's The Brendan Voyage. Being in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean in mid-March, though, there's a good chance it'll be be clouded over too, though... though if I don't try, I'll never know. (And if I do intend to go, I'd better start planning early, as lots of eclipse-chasers will try and descend on these rather small islands. The only other landfall the path of totality makes is Svalbard in the high Arctic, though it narrowly misses the coast of Iceland.) 12 August 2026 may be a better bet, as totality there passes through north Spain. Failing that there's 2 August 2027, where totality passes through southern Spain and the Maghreb.
• Experience being in a jacuzzi. This ought to be a bit easier than the last couple. :o)
• Take a cow-orker up on the offer he made last year of joining him on one of his regular churchbell-ringing sessions. This is even easier still: I can do this this very week, having verified that his church is cohen-friendly.
• I think I ought to broaden my mind by attending services of other religions. I've experienced Christian services of a kind at school, but I've never experienced a proper Muslim or Hindu service. When (for example) I saw the film of The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, I was struck by how Christian-based the portrayal of an alien religion we see there briefly was. Obviously, whilst my own Judaism allows me to get my head out of that box, the fact I've never attended services of any other religion means I've merely switched it for a slightly larger box. [ETA: In the decade after I posted this, I attended a Muslim service, and a Shinto one (though with no understanding of what was going on in the latter, and limited of the former).]
• I was rather impressed by the paintings of margavriel that hatam_soferet posted; also by the fact aviva_m's parents have a portrait of her great-grandmother hanging up in their house. I don't think anyone in my family has ever been painted. So, maybe I should commission a portrait to celebrate turning forty, perhaps, and then present it to my parents afterwards? (Shh, don't tell them! Besides, it's just a vague idea at this stage.)
• Read the books (mostly classics) I've been vaguely meaning to read for years but not got as far as actually putting on my to-read list.

Several of the lists I was looking at listed swimming with dolphins, so maybe I should add this to my list too.

Apart from that, does anyone else have any suggestions for experiences I should add to my life?

Comments

[curious-reader.livejournal.com]

I also would try an airballoon and swimming with dolphins. Maybe I will do it later in life when I have a secured income.

[hatam-soferet.livejournal.com]

I'll hook you up with Gabriel's portrait-painter, if you like. She did his from photographs. School chum of Darcy's as well.

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

Possibly not immediately, as I've just presented them with one of the Victorian-dress photos (http://lethargic-man.livejournal.com/323798.html) of aviva_m and me I got from them for Chanukah (though I wouldn't tell them what the money was for until I showed them the photos). But thanks.

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

I've no other specific ideas, but I'm impressed by the list so far: cool but achievable.

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

Be impressed when I actually get off my tochus and do them...

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

:) Well, yes. But a good start is a good start :)

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

These all sound like things you could just as easily do after forty as before. Is there anything you'd really like to do before your joints start rattling?

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

As Hillel the Elder said, "אם לא עכשיו, אימתי" ("if not now, when?"). But apart from that, not that I can think of immediately. Do you have any suggestions?

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Well, if you're planning to have kids, I'd really recommend doing that before forty, so you have a fighting chance of seeing grandkids grow up. Ever wanted to climb a mountain, run a marathon or play a social team sport? Not that many people can't do these things when they're older, but what you don't see are all the ones who can't because of chronic injuries (he says, from the sidelines, as he contemplates never playing soccer again). I'd also say "learn to make friends out of strangers", because of all the older people I know, it's the ones who have the most friends who are the happiest.

My list of 100 things to do before I die

[miss-whiplash.livejournal.com]

I've only managed to build a list of 6 things towards my list of 100 so far : -

Get thrown out of a pub for bad behaviour.

Ride a rollercoaster.

Play on a bouncy castle.

Take my own "hippy train" of friends on a 4x4 world tour. No itinerary, no arrival dates, just wander and stay as and where the mood takes, maybe never get back.

Abseil.

Visit Alaska.

Re: My list of 100 things to do before I die

[curious-reader.livejournal.com]

Have you tried shouting yet? That usually draws the attention to the door men.

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

if you're planning to have kids, I'd really recommend doing that before forty, so you have a fighting chance of seeing grandkids grow up.

If my hypothetical children take as long to get about it as I have, I might as well forget about seeing grandchildren at all... It was never my plan to still be unmarried at anything like my age, but the best laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley...

Ever wanted to climb a mountain, run a marathon or play a social team sport?

Not in the slightest in the second two cases; the first I've already done, but am now rather frightened of doing again. There's a path in Ein Avdat in Israel up the side of a cliff; mostly the path's three feet wide, but at one place it narrows to less than a foot, with a sheer cliff on one side and a drop on the other. It took some nerve getting past that when I was nineteen, but I talked myself into it by saying it must be safe; everyone else gets past that without problems.

That attitude abruptly deserted me when I heard, a few years later, that someone had fallen at Ein Avdat and died.

[snjstar.livejournal.com]

I saw the total eclipse of the sun in 1999.