If wishes were fishes...

Do you remember when you were a kid and the grown-ups would ask you what you wanted to be when you grew up?

I remember wanting to ride show-jumpers, be a competetive swimmer of some sort, or a dancer, a teacher, a doctor, a shrink of some variety, a writer, a singer, a jockey, an actress, a model (hah!), an advice columnist, a forest ranger, a marine biologist, and any number of things. Mostly things that involved nature, creativity, or healing. Hmm.

Now that I'm supposedly grown-up, I still have things I want to be. Or at least do.

I have always wanted to scuba dive. I've swum, snorkeled, and sailed, but I've never been scuba diving. I love the deep water, I've just never had the time or money to go learn and be certified - and now I can add a distinct lack of confidence in my physicality to the list of "why not?" Still, I hope to manage this one in the not-too-distant future.

I would love to sky dive, while we're on the subject of diving. Deep water, open sky, same-same. Sky diving looks so free...this one may not ever happen, but a gal can dream.

I think learning to fly would be fun, too. Or maybe to operate one of those glider thingies - you know, the ones they tow behind an airplane and then release to float back to earth?

I'd love to brush up on my sailing skills - for all I talk about sailing as a kid, it's been several decades since I actually did it, and I'm afraid that only bit of it I can still do with any confidence is the knot tying...you never forget how to tie a good knot, and it's always a useful skill to have.

I've often wished I could ride a horse at something faster than a canter. I never did, and riding is something else I haven't done in a long while. I'd like to own a horse, but I'd have to re-learn how to care for the beasts. They eat pickles, right?

I'd like to go to Alaska. I don't know if I'm hearty enough to live there, but it'd be nice to visit some of the less touristy bits and take a million or so pictures.

Speaking of visiting places - Australia and New Zealand would be nice, too. And, umm...let's see...Ireland, Wales, Scotland, England, and a number of the United States that I've missed in all my travels. I like wild places, rugged places, places where nature still has a presence. I also like places with history, where pieces of humanity are still standing long after the people are gone. Following the Roman wall through Paris would be one of the few reasons I ever went back to that city.

Visiting the sacred spaces of the world would be brilliant, too.

I've been hot-air ballooning, and would like to do it again - this time without garnering the back injury that still plagues me some fifteen or so years later.

I'd like to go back to school, if I could just go and learn without having to declare a major or worry about grades. I'd really like to root around in some of the sciences a bit more - chemistry, physics, and quantum physics mostly, although biology, geology, and a number of other -ologies would be fun, too. I can read books aplenty (and I do) but having a proper teacher to ask questions of, to explain the many, many, many bits I don't quite get, would be tremendous.

I'd also like to study more art, more history, more everything.

Also, winning the lottery would be nice. Oh, the things I'd do...

And while I am wishing things up...heh...I'd really like to not only finish a story/book/whatever the hell I'm writing, but maybe even manage to get the dang thing published. Sigh.

Well, if wishes were fishes, beggars would eat.

What do you wish you could be or do, grown up or not?