I do not have a metaphorical list of things to do in life. I have a literal, physical list. I started it when I was 15 years old. I remember the noise the pen made on the notebook paper. (It’s hard to remember that I was once able to hear such noises). I remember carefully tearing the pages along the perforated edges of my spiral notebook. I folded it up and tucked it inside my journal.
In its first iteration, the list had over 100 things on it. Some of them were emotional (“fall in love with someone who loves me back”), some academic (“get a doctorate”), some simple (“paint my bedroom purple”), some about specific skills (“learn how to shoot a bow and arrow”), and others about experiences (“see the pyramids at Giza”, “swim in all four oceans”). One of them was to go to a Mayan temple. It was specifically written as “Go to Chichen Itza or a Mayan temple site.”
In the years that have followed, I have done many of the things on my list. I also periodically add to it. There are some things I will never do because they were linked to a specific timepoint or situation I never found myself in. I don’t mind. The list is a map, not an itinerary. It is the compass pointing to the true north of my life. It doesn’t mind if I sail around the bottom of the world to get there.
I have been in Mexico since last Sunday. It has been a very challenging week. There were major problems with my reservations and transportation and the staff have been frustratingly rude about correcting their mistakes. I have had some misadventures with my port and that was scary. (Fortunately, I have been on antibiotics for several days now and the port does not seem to be infected.) It was not exactly the relaxing week I was hoping for but I don’t think I’ve had a relaxing week in years so at least it wasn’t unfamiliar.
Yesterday, I got to watch a very dear friend get married on a beautiful beach covered by a warm, sweet wind as the sun went down. I got to watch my sister officiate the wedding and we were all excited to think that the next wedding we all attend will be my sister’s wedding next April. And today, after almost 20 years, I went to Coba, a large Mayan temple complex an hour from the resort I am staying at.
I was so excited to be able to do this. I was also scared. My life is an exercise in adjusting expectations. I have been let down so many times by this failing vessel my soul occupies. I would be crushed if I travelled all this way and couldn’t get to Coba.
My heart has been broken so many times by this body and the life it has imposed upon me. So many times I have felt like tiny pieces of me have been chiseled away along the lines of all these tiny spiderwebbing fractures. And most days I can cope with that and most days I like my life. But this was too important to me and I felt so vulnerable and so exposed. I was really scared that I would come so close and somehow miss this opportunity.
The weather was not cooperative. It rained a spectacular amount today. It took much longer than expected to get there because we had to drive slowly. It was the kind of rain that laughs at umbrellas and boots and ponchos. We were all completely soaked in a matter of seconds. But we were there. For an hour and a half, my family and I sloshed through mud puddles and negotiated the additional slipperiness of steps worn smooth and uneven long ago. My sister and her fiance got bicycles to ride to the biggest temple. My mom and I took a rickshaw to meet them there.
And then suddenly, emerging through the dense lush green of the jungle, there it was. We turned a corner and despite the special futility that is seeing things through wet glasses, I could see it. The largest pyramid, the one I had seen in so many books. The one I saw in an encyclopedia in seventh grade and never forget.
Cardio exercise is hairy for me under the absolute best circumstances and I avoid it as fiercely as I avoid undercooked egg whites. But I had made it so far and couldn’t leave without trying. I pushed down my fear and started climbing. It was wet and slick and hot. I kept my eyes on the steps and climbed, one hand on the rope strung down from the top, the other on the steps. If I turned around, if I looked at how high I was, if I thought about how easy it would be to fall, I would never have made it. I kept my head down and kept my eyes on the step immediately in before me. I moved forward and I didn’t look back. And almost 20 years after writing the entry in my list of things to do, I climbed to the very top of a Mayan pyramid.
One of my sister’s best friends is Buddhist. She was also in Mexico this week for the wedding. Last night, we chatted about living a good life with chronic illness. (She is a diabetic.) She told me that one of the leaders of her sect of Buddhism believes that for everything that can ail the body, there is a perfect medicine to cure it. Nothing can be done that cannot be undone with something somewhere in this world. Maybe it takes forever to find it. Maybe we never find it. But it is there nonetheless, waiting for us.
Maybe all those crystal slivers of my heart that I have lost were not really lost but scattered. Maybe this is the perfect medicine. To cross things off my list, to go to these places. To live your dreams when you are never even sure you will live until tomorrow.
To believe things will get better and that your life is good. That this life has value and so do you.
To move forward. And don’t look back.
