Today, something incredible happened.
Honestly, when I woke up this morning all I could think was “I’m tired,” And sometimes, I have to admit, “I’m tired,” becomes “I don’t want to.” But church always makes me feel better. My friends and colleagues make me smile, the choir puts me at ease, the sermon makes me think in a positive and constructive way, and all that was affirmed for me this morning, with an added bonus.
While greeting fellow worshippers this morning, a woman approached me and asked if I could do her “a wicked big favor,” I smiled because even after three years I’m still new to New England-ish. I imagine I sometimes sound the same when I refer to any group of people as “y’all” and use phrases I’m pretty sure my grandparents must have invented based on the looks I get when they slip out. The woman asked me to take a picture of her and her friend. She said, “I listen to Marsh Chapel every week on the radio so this is on my bucket list!” How cool is that? Something I do every Sunday was on somebody’s bucket list. Immediately any thought of how little sleep I got this week or how many papers I had coming up melted away. I was part of someone’s bucket list.
I started thinking about my own bucket list. I’m pretty lucky. I’ve checked a lot of things off. This summer alone I climbed the steps to Sacre Coeur, saw a play in Shakespeare’s Globe and visited Annecy, France where St. Francis de Sales and Jane de Chantal founded the Visitation Order which provided my first fourteen years of education. Even my Boston bucket list has gotten shorter this year, I saw a Celtics game, went apple picking with my friends and walked all the way from the waterfront to my apartment in Fenway on an Autumn day. But I think my favorite things have always been being present when someone else got to check something off their list. The best life experiences are the ones we share with others.