Goodbye bucket lists, hello living lists

As people get older, you often hear of them checking off their bucket lists, but some now say having a bucket list is passée. The new trend is “living lists,” and those lists mean a lot for a lucky group of seniors.

When you picture seniors you might think of them in a quiet room doing puzzles, not taking a whirl in a helicopter. That was on the living list for Toni Cowan and Norma Campbell.

“I’m actually afraid of heights and when I first thought of it I thought, ‘Oh dear, maybe this isn’t a good idea.’ But I had no fear whatsoever until it started to tilt,” said Cowan. “It tilted to the right and I looked at Norma and said, ‘Oh,’ and she looked at me and said, ‘ohhh!'”

“I always wanted to do it and i got the opportunity and it was great,” said Campbell.

Management at Lasalle Park came up with the idea and staff put out the call.

“We had all of our staff, we got everybody involved and had all the staff net approaching residents and asking them what’s something they’d like to do,” said Margaret Milley of Lasalle Park.

For Jean Miller, 99, it was going for a ride in a police car.

“I thought it would be rather exciting and something different and something to remember all my life,” said Miller.

None of the residents paid a dime for any of their wishes. Anything that was not donated was paid for by staff.