Your life list, non-sportswriting version

Never saw this thread before but I like it so here goes. These are the things I'm most proud of (so far)...

1.) When I was nine years old, I watched WrestleMania 10 live on PPV. It was in New York, about a four hour drive from my house and on that day, I promised myself I would one day sit at ringside for a WrestleMania. I accomplished that goal on April 2nd, 2006 by attending WrestleMania 22 in Chicago, three rows behind the announcers, at the age of 21. I almost cried.

2.) Growing up, my parents told us every year that were going to go to DisneyWorld that summer and it never happened. I can not express to you how disappointing this was. I finally got there, on my own, in the summer of 2007 and felt like a kid the whole time. I am one of only two members of my immediate family to ever go.

3.) The first four years in this business, I tried to win awards and failed miserably to even get a nomination. Last year, I won first and third-place awards in my state's contest, a second-place award in the region contest and a second-place award in a small-market national contest. It was these awards that confirmed for me that I can write gooder than I thought

4.) My brother was the best man at my wedding but, because he was 19 at the time, threw me the best bachelor party he could when I was getting married in the summer of 2010 but it was absolutely awful. Last November, three of my closest high school friends and I went to Atlantic City and, without even trying to, finally had the bachelor party I always wanted. It was, easily, the most fun night of my life.

5.) Despite having a family history of alcoholism--to the point where I can confidently say it killed two of my grandparents and will, sadly, get my father some day--I have only had three shots in my entire life. The first was when I was 25 at the aforementioned awful bachelor party. The second was last summer when I was 26 and at a bachelor party for a friend of mine. The third was when I turned 27. I have no plans to have a fourth.

6.) My entire family is full of two packs-a-day smokers. I have never taken a single puff.

7.) Despite not really knowing what I was doing, I began shooting weddings for friends in the summer of 2010. In that time, I've shot three weddings as the only photographer (one of which I just did two weeks ago) and have been told repeatedly that I am not only good but great and my photographs have been plastered all over their homes. I am extremely touched by this.

8.) I have the best and most hilarious "How I lost my virginity" story of anyone I've ever met. I won't post it here since I have done so about 10 times already but PM me if you don't remember/haven't heard and are interested.

9.) I met my wife at a Halloween party in college. She was dressed as a dead school girl. I was shooting the event for my college newspaper. The week the pictures from the event came out, I remember thinking "How weird would it be if I married this girl I met at that party?"

10.) My brother and I spent an afternoon as extras in a movie that would eventually earn an Academy Award nomination for Best Picture (The Fighter).

I'm sure there are others I'd add to this list but these are the ones I can remember off the top of my head.

 

My list seems quite shallow, but... if you had told me when I was a kid I would get the chance to do all of this, I don't know if I would have believed it.

- saw games at (old) Yankee Stadium (okay - not old, old - but not the new one); Fenway (before they tarted up the place and put seats on the Monster) and Wrigley (caught my first ball during BP with my newly bought Cubs hat in the bleachers (I think Helton hit it deep) - even better, I was with my Dad on a week-long Chicago trip - we also hit the Art Institute, and I saw a game at Soldier Field before they redid that place as well).
- Seen a show on Broadway (Annie Get Your Gun with Bernadette Peters and Tom Wopat)
- Visited DC pre-9/11 and saw the sights
- Been to Alaska (saw a glacier and rode in a float-plane) and Hawaii.
- Saw a Kansas-Texas basketball game at Allen Fieldhouse.
- Saw a Series game
- Saw Oregon State notch a winning season in football (and seen them in a bowl game)
- walked across the GG Bridge
- Appeared on a game show
- Appeared as an extra on a TV show
- Graduated from college after 12 years, five colleges and only after pulling an A in a final in a math class I was failing going into the final.
- Took an amazing trip though the South (Bristol Nascar race, Tennessee football game, Andersonville Prison, Montgomery, Birmingham, Tupelo, Memphis and Nashville)
- Took an amazing trip through the Southwest (White Sands, Four Corners, Monument Valley)

To do: Ireland and France/Europe; NHL game in Canada;