My List (continued)

What I am afraid of? Nothing out of the ordinary, that’s for sure: heights, creepy bugs, small spaces, things that go bump in the night, bad things happening to my kids. Since I cannot do anything about the last two, and critters only really bother me when I’m caught by surprise or when I’m trying to sleep (“ack! what’s that THING in my sleeping bag?”), I’m going to explore facing the others.

There is something about looking over a railing down to the teeny tiny world below that makes my stomach twist up in knots. I cannot ride in a glass elevator with my eyes open beyond the 4th floor or so. I’ve been on a very small airplane to a very remote place and I’m thinking once is enough for that kind of experience – for sure.

Of course bungy-jumping or parachuting would be scary things to tackle. For the list, however, I’m going to say that hang-gliding is something I have easy access to and would certainly never forget. You can probably die hang-gliding, right? I promise I’ll take pictures.

I suppose if I were really serious about this Face Your Fears thing, I would try to overcome my fear of small spaces by doing some cave exploring. But I just don’t want to. Isn’t that enough? Bleh. Makes my stomach hurt just looking at pictures of it.


This one is easy. I love road trips with no itinerary. Even better if they are smack in the middle of somewhere I’ve never been before. Extra points if no one speaks English! If you know me, you’ve probably been on such an adventure with me. Wasn’t it fun?! Raise your hand if you were on that hike out in the desert following a wash and then the wash turned into a muddy pit with 20ft tall razor-edged reeds growing on either side and there was no way out and no water and the sun was setting and… Good times, man. Good times.

There are lots of different ways to get lost. Sometimes I think it would be fun to pretend to be someone else for a weekend, check into a swanky hotel and sip martinis by the pool in my designer bathing suit. Ha ha. I’ll keep that option open for sure.

But I still have to put something on my list that fits into this category and think its going to have to be more deeply immersed in a really foreign culture. I would love to go to Africa and live among the Masai.

Hmm. No excuses, right?

But to pick something a little closer to home: It would be interesting to travel to the Sinaloa region of Mexico where my grandmother was raised on an American socialist commune. (I can hear all my friends saying “Ah ha. That’s where she gets it!”) Of course, things went downhill for Americans after the Mexican revolution and I’m not sure its any safer today.

NO EXCUSES!! That’s what Phil would say. I wonder how Phil’s wife feels about being a single mom for weeks or months at a time while he is out “fulfilling his dreams.”