After my husband died, and I became accustomed to being a widow, if that’s possible, it took me a couple years to pick myself up by the boot straps with lots of encouragement from family and friends and make my bucket list.
I had a little money to start with, but it could easily be spent on one cruise, one plane ticket cross country or one drive to the mountains. So, I had to have a plan, and the plan I shared with you on my last post is exactly what I did. I would have no problem starting out alone, I’ve done it before. However, with health issues it was not advisable for sure.
So, list made, I began talking to my long-time friend Patricia Lynn who caught the vision and immediately my list seemed doable. Naturally we went to a travel agent, told them what we wanted to accomplish and she gave us a price we could live with. From there we were like two giddy teenagers getting ready for a double date. We talked several times a week, and found odd jobs to boost our cruise funds. We rat-holed our dimes and dollars until we were ready to go a year later in February when cruises as a rule are much more reasonable. I even had us each a shirt made of our “bucket list”. It isn’t finished but at least we can still look at the shirt and plan some more.
Yes, we were giddy and I did not realize I was having problems with a long-time heart issue. With difficulty breathing and feeling exhausted (laying it on the fact I had been too busy to rest) it did make sense to take myself to the Doctor. After an EKG, I was found to be in A/Fib and was told to go to the hospital the next morning which was a day before the start of our trip, to be cardio verted.
Doing as a good patient would, I did and was on my way within 24 hours to New Orleans to board the ship on Saturday. It was the start of a wonderful trip. My friend’s first cruise and definitely mine. Of all my travels I had not been to Mexico and it was about to happen. The details can be added later if they are even necessary, however we were safely on board for several hours when I realized my heart was not acting as it should. My ability to walk from one end of the ship to the other was met with impossibility without stopping to rest at least 2-3 times.
My dear friend learned to entertain herself as going far from my cabin was next to impossible. Guilt laden emotions added to my inability to enjoy my first cruise. This was to be her maiden voyage and here she is feeling responsible for me. Anyway, we made memories, I didn’t get as many pictures as I wanted, none really to look back on and say, “remember that?”
So, the crux of this bucket list story is to:
1.
factor in
any health issue you may have and be prepared.
We went to the on-duty Doctors but decided they could and would not
cardio=vert me and do nothing more than tell me what I already knew. My heart
was beating too fast and irregular. So,
we donned a wheelchair and did what we had planned to do at each port. Go shopping with my trusted friend having to
push the wheel chair. Again, guilt laden
for ruining her trip I apologized until she wanted to dump me into the Ocean,
(just kidding). She was a trooper.
2.
Talk to the agent about possibilities and you
may be faced with decisions on insurance, and the what if’s we all would rather
not deal with. As we age not all of us
are in top notch health, but it should not deter us from planning. It may not be a cruise, it could be a couple hours plane ride to “The Price is
Right” or “Jeopardy” or to Washington DC to the Smithsonian or Arlington
National Cemetery.
3.
The ideas are endless. Just go for it.
