Thinking about regrets

On vacations, Sandy would start saying, "We never did [fill in the blank]" long before the opportunity for doing whatever it was had passed. In mid-summer, she'd start sighing about all that we hadn't gotten to (kayaking, camping, going out of town, biking somewhere), though we still had months of nice weather ahead of us. I tend to look to the future, so this premature regret always struck me as odd. I assumed it had to do with her depression: focusing on what we hadn't experienced instead of appreciating what we'd done. But she never seemed that despondent over it; it sounded more like a criticism, that she was saying we'd let inertia or laziness keep us from some great opportunity. Because it felt like criticism, it often irked me. In fact, more than once, she was wistful about not doing something that I'd tried to arrange, but she'd decided she would rather do something else. At some point, I stopped arguing with her expressions of regret and instead started trying to find ways we could get to the things that were important to her.

Despite her tendency to have regrets early, she was much
better at living in the moment than I ever was. On bike rides,
I'd be ticking off the miles ridden while she'd enjoy the
view or the feeling of the wind on her face or the joy of
her body and bicycle working in synch. I learned a lot from
Sandy about just being in a moment in our lives.

"We never did" is not my sentence-starter. It's Sandy's. I was more likely to say, "Next year, let's." But then, I expected the universe to grant us limitless opportunities. I didn't expect either of us to die before we'd had a chance to do everything we wanted to do.

Now I say "We never did" frequently, usually to myself or to Sandy. It feels like I'm channeling Sandy every time I say it: We never did build the raised mosaic patio next to the laurel in the back yard. We never did remodel the kitchen. We never did get a dog, get married, weatherize the house, bike to Ashland with friends, program the universal remote, travel to Turkey, get our photos organized, write summaries of the years we shared, make our own mozzarella, take that canning class, buy new swimsuits. We never did volunteer at Food Lifeline, get good window coverings for her room, buy her an electric bike, work through the most challenging issues in our relationship.

And we never will do any of those things. The window has closed on important and small tasks alike. Many of those items remain on my list, and I may get to them, but we'll never get to do them together.

This perspective has given me more sympathy for the regrets and wistfulness she felt. But I've also come to recognize how silly it is to write things off when you can still do them. Which are the things  I most want to accomplish or experience before I die? And which are the things that can safely join the "never got to" list when I die? I want to keep the distinction in mind, but mainly I want to focus on all that I do get to do and enjoy. There will be plenty of time for regrets after I'm gone.