AN UNORTHODOX APPROACH TO
LIFE’S GOLDEN MONTHS
REPLACE JACK NICKOLSON’S AND
MORGAN FREEMAN’S “BUCKET LIST”
WITH
EARL BRONSTEEN’S “G.Y.P. LIST”
This essay is a primer for people who have been told by their physician that they have months to live - - - not as bad as having days to live; but not nearly as good as having years to live.
I remember the day I received the chilling news, which really didn’t hit home until my oncologist patted my shoulder as he passed by to exit the sterile examination room. His nurse repeated the hand gesture a week later when she met with me. You think having a bad hair day is unpleasant - - - just wait until the day your physician pats your shoulder - - - it’s the medical profession’s kiss of death.
I don’t know how many of you had the opportunity to watch the 2007 movie, “Bucket List”. So for those of you who missed this wonderful film the plot follows two terminally ill men (portrayed by Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman) with a “Wish List” of things to do and places to visit before they "kicked the bucket".
I wasn’t terminally ill but I had been fighting lymphoma for 17 years, so the film’s theme resonated within me.
Jump forward 6 years to March 2013. I never made a Bucket List and the ensuing recession put a crimp in our spending plans but I can honestly say that I’ve done, seen and enjoyed almost everything that would have been on my Bucket List - - - which is all to the good because a little over a year ago the side effects of the years of “chemo” hit my bone marrow’s reproduction ability and I contracted a non-curable blood disorder.
I’m suggesting you make up a “G.Y.P. List” (Give Yourself Permission List) of things to do, or not to do, in your remaining weeks or months. This isn’t one of those pamphlets life insurance sales people give out that instructs you to list all your assets, liabilities, cars and insurance information etc. No, this is less practical but advice: Give yourself permission to do almost whatever you want to do.
HERE’S BRONSTEEN’S G.Y.P. LIST
1. Give yourself permission to change your diet. Go out and wolf down a Double Cheeseburger every week. There’s no need to watch what you eat anymore, so splurge on all the foods you’ve avoided. Go to McDonalds one week, Burger King the next and then onto Kentucky Fried.
And don’t forget the fries.
If you are “writerly” inclined, you might even want to write a review of the different fast food franchises in your neighborhood and post them on your Blog or on Trip Advisor. Even if old age or illness has severely impaired your sense of taste I wouldn’t keep that from writing restaurant reviews. It seems to me that that deficiency hasn’t kept others from passing judgment on the quality of their meals.
Start off by trading in ‘choice’ meats for ‘prime’ - - - Ruth's Chris Steak House's porterhouse comes slathered in butter for a mouth-watering, arterial-clogging gustatory experience
Trade in starches for green veggies, whole milk for the no fat, no taste variety and double rich-salad dressing for the bland stuff. Make it a point to seek out adulterated, non-organic, trans-fatty and fried foods. You’ll thank me when you see how much better they taste. However, I wouldn’t go so far as to drink the water in Mexico, eat from a food stall in Burma or eat fish (or any food) from China.
If Taco Bell’s “enchilada helper” tastes good to you, pour on the hot sauce and “vivir a lo grande”. And if chopped liver with schmaltz (chicken fat) on top has never passed between your lips now is the time to savor this Jewish delicacy.
2. Give yourself permission to wear whatever clothes you like, dirty or clean. (This item unfortunately does not apply to married men!)
3. Give yourself permission to do nothing. Just lie back on a lounger and watch a stupid sitcom, an old movie starring June Allyson or cartoons - - - or even better - - -there’s nothing more satisfying than taking an early nap, followed by a glass of brisk iced tea, followed by another nap. It’s perfection. And the more you sleep the better it is because then there will be less of a shock to your system when you die. (You won’t find information like this on WebMD.)
4. Give yourself permission to reduce your expectations. So what if you didn’t become a famous actor, writer, columnist, politician etc. Even if you don’t even achieve your “fifteen minutes of fame”, that’s OK - - - as far as I’m concerned Andy Warhol’s soapboxes are no big deal. You might not have been happier, or even a better person, if you had become famous. Who wants to be have the paparazzi following your ever footstep, especially if you use a walker. And look what happened to Lady Di, Marilyn etc.
5. Give yourself permission to think about lighting up a cigarette. This is a tricky one. I smoked for 30 years and had a lot of trouble kicking the habit, but I did 30 years or so ago. It is such a dirty habit and I associate it with the Tobacco Hearings in Washington decades ago when the heads of all the major tobacco companies raised their hand to swear that tobacco wasn’t a killer. You’re on your own on this one.
6. Give yourself permission to turn down dinner invitations from the couple whose wife doesn’t stop talking from the first hello to the last goodbye.
7. Give yourself permission to stop expecting a new miracle drug to be announced that will put your disease in remission. It ain’t going to happen.
8. Give yourself permission to keep buying Powerball Lottery tickets, but if you win take the lump sum settlement.
9. Give yourself permission to buy yellow bananas. I know that this will signify to those around you in Publix that you are on your way out, but what the hell. If someone around you snickers when they see you buying ripe bananas just whip out one of the bananas and point it at them and shout, “Go ahead. Make my day.”
10. Give yourself permission to buy something you’ve always wanted but felt it was too expensive. I don’t mean buy yourself a Rolex, just because Roger Federer is trying to make you feel that you’ll be as good a tennis player as he is if you buy one. I mean some item that you could easily afford, but that you felt was just too expensive for what it was.
For example, if you went to a fancy steak restaurant and there was a 2-½ lb. lobster on the menu and it was marked “Market Price”. If the waiter informed you that the price was $85 chances are most of you wouldn’t order it, even those of you with substantial assets. It just seems too overpriced so you don’t order it.
For me the item is Manero’s Gorgonzola Salad Dressing, which we used to enjoy at his restaurant in Greenwich years and years ago. On the Internet it costs $19.95 for 4 pints and then you have to kick in ten bucks for shipping and finally you have to get in your car and drive to the market to buy your own Gorgonzola cheese. Well, I just ordered it and you can do the same.
11. Give yourself permission to accept one of those Free Lunch Seminar invitations that you received in the mail to be held at Morton's The Steakhouse to listen to a one-hour lecture on annuities followed by a steak dinner on the house. Perhaps to follow the rules of etiquette you should limit the number of such acceptances to 50. (This listing is autobiographical and I have a book to prove it.)
12. Speaking of food once again, give yourself permission, when you and your wife are invited out to a very expensive steak restaurant, and the steaks you ordered “rare” are served “well done”, to call over the waiter and send the overcooked steaks back. This one is autobiographical of sorts in that another invited couple at the same table, both in their nineties, just sat there and politely picked at their food and never made a peep. At their age I don’t know how many more chances they’ll have for a free filet.
13. Give yourself permission to write a letter to the president of the Diamond Fish Corporation of Brooklyn, NY telling him that the Marinated Salmon they distribute for the Blue Diamond Bay Company is delicious but the jar is made up of tiny unappetizing-looking scraps of salmon, not a single bite sized piece in the jar. And when he doesn’t answer I give you permission to mail him, via Parcel Post, a small box containing some of the scraps.
14. (A)
Give yourself permission to plan your own funeral. Your life might have been pretty humdrum but that’s no reason not to go out in style. First, sit out in the sun or even go to a Sun Tanning Parlor to bronze your face. There’s nothing more off-putting than a pale face in a pine box (except, I guess, to a member of a tribe of Plains Indians in the 1800's).
(B)
Hire a Funeral Planner to handle everything. They take all the details off your hands and even guarantee a certain number of attendees, beef-up your priest’s or rabbi’s eulogy with just the right amount of tasteful hyperbole that your life’s accomplishments undoubtedly need and on top of that they get the newspapers to run a separate obituary with photo. They are pricey but well worth it. FUNERALS R’ US has offices from Palm Beach to Boca Raton. Their slogan is, "Let Us Put The FUN back in Funerals."
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Use their services and you can avoid life’s final rejection i.e. being turned down by The New York Times Obituary Page. |
15. Give yourself permission to write to the head of your local hospital to complain about the services performed by one of its doctors. If for example, and this is a hypothetical, you waited over three hours for a biopsy and the doctor never apologized for being late and then was in such a rush that he never made sure that a proper sample had been taken and that the traumatic and painful procedure was useless - - - write a letter - - -just make sure never to use that hospital again.
16. Give yourself permission not to ever press a button in an elevator, especially in a hospital or cruise ship. Even if a little old lady in a wheelchair comes into the elevator and asks you to press, “3 please”, pretend you are deaf, which you probably are anyway.
17. Give yourself permission to buy a Donald Trump mask and parade on Easter Sunday in front of his Fifth Avenue building and pass out free samples of Donald’s personal hair spray.
18. Give yourself permission to take the road more travelled. Often the road less travelled leads to a creek and the odds are better than 5 to 1 that you forgot to bring a paddle.
19. Give yourself permission to cancel all your appointments at the gym. There’s no need to tire yourself out needlessly. Save your strength for an afternoon nap.
20. Give yourself permission to buy 16 ounce bottles of your favorite sugary soda.
21. Give yourself permission to ask your friends who are praying for you to be very specific in their entreaties i.e. pray for more white blood cells.
22. Give yourself permission to start your day off on the right foot with a platter of well-salted scrambled eggs, fatty bacon and white toast, heavily buttered.
23. Give yourself permission to drink all the Red Bull you want.
24. Give yourself permission to drink white wine with red meat and red wine with white fish.
25. Give yourself permission to combine #23 and #24 and drink Red Bull with a red wine chaser.
26. And if you want to put a little excitement in your life give yourself permission to book a cruise on Carnival Cruise Lines
- - - just bring along your own portable toilet.
27. Give yourself permission to stop flossing.
28. Give yourself permission to burn your AARP membership card.
And as my last item:
Give your self permission to keep hating those who have treated you terribly in the past. I know all Dear Abbey ‘read-alikes’ preach just the opposite i.e. that before you go to the grave you should forgive the people who have shafted you in the past. That’s the worst possible advice. Why make them feel better? Believe me you will only feel worse.
I’ll take this one step further by suggesting you have a “To Hell With You Night”. Buy as many voodoo dolls as you need - - - they sell them in vending machines in a section of Miami. Darken a room, save for candlelight, open a bottle of champagne and then ceremoniously stick pins in each of the dolls. There’s a certain feeling of exhilaration as the pins go into your nemeses, like the ‘rush’ of skiing down a mountain of glistening white powder at full speed with the wind whistling by your head.
Here’s a “Suggestion List” of people you might want to include in your list. This is “one-list-fits all” and is not auto-biographical:
1. Your boss of many years who made your life a misery.
2. Your “ex” who jilted you and took all your money and kids.
3. The construction companies and repairmen who fleeced you for big sums.
4. The people you lent money to and who never repaid the loans.
5. The people who ostracized you socially.
6. The guy from Nigeria who sent you an email announcing that you had won $950,000 and all you had to do is send $195 to secure your funds - - - and who you never heard from again.
7. The used car salesman who sold you your first car at age 18 who said he wouldn’t cheat you because his son was also in the Army.
8. Any used car salesman.
9. Any man seated on a subway car who would break out laughing when he looked up at you standing in front of him- - - when you were a teen-aged, pimply-faced youth on your way to high school.
10. Any pre-teen girl who would devastate you by not letting you kiss her when the two of you went into a closet to enjoy the fruits of your supposedly having won her “lips” in a game of spin-the bottle.
11. Any museum director to whom your wife is related who wouldn’t take two hours to come to your art studio to view your work.
12. Any director and any curator at another local museum neither of whom would take an hour to visit your 8,400 square foot art gallery/ studio.
13. The first girl you asked to dance……
14. The second girl you asked to dance……
15. The first girl you asked to _ _ _ _.
16. There is no # 16. No one else said no.
ENJOY! LIVE IT UP. I GIVE YOU MY PERMISSION
I also give you permission to read the story that follows this one and is about my "Brief Encounter" in 1943.
