It seems everyone, these days, has a Bucket List: A pail full of large dreams they want to accomplish. Go to Tibet. Parachute. Scuba dive. Climb the Great Pyramid. Swim with whales. Sunbathe under the Tuscan sun.
Those are all great, but I’m getting a lot of enjoyment out of my Sandpail List: A pail full of small things that fill in the cracks between the big bucket list items. The analogy comes from the fact that, if you fill your bucket with large rocks, you can still pour an entire bucket — or two — of sand in between the rocks.
Sand represents things like: canoe with the salmon on the Sammamish. Feel fresh cheese curds squeek on my teeth. Karaoke “Born 2B Wild” at a biker bar. Film my daughter holding her mom’s hand. Make fresh apple cider on a cider press with wormy green apples. Admire blonde hair shimmering in the fall full moonlight.
These are things I can find — and do — every day, so my life is not just a continual Waiting for Bucket List Godot Moments, but a continual revelation and enjoyment of the small but wonderful moments that make up a good life.

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Addendum: Adding droplets of water June 7, 2011, 15:15 p.m.
A friend reminded me of the rest of the analogy. Even when the bucket is full of stones (the large, bucket list items), and sand (the smaller, sand pail list items), there is still room for water. Drop by drop, water fills the bucket to overflowing… even when it’s already “full” of large stones and sand.
But what are the water droplets that fill our pails? This was the question I kept asking myself. The small, sand pail items that make up a wonderful life … they seemed to be the things that were in my life daily, the “small and wonderful moments”.
And then it hit me: The droplets of water is everything else that makes me smile. But, more importantly, it’s looking at everything else so it DOES make me smile. Today is a rainy, cold Seattle summer day. At 3:20 p.m., there is no sand pail list item to bring me joy, and certainly no bucket list “big ticket” item to rock my world… yet I look out my window and see the American flag on my neighbors house, fitfully blowing in the afternoon breeze. I’m reminded of what a great country we live in, my heart is warmed, and a teardrop moistens the corner of my eye … and falls into my bucket. And the leaves are green, and the air is scented and misty, and my bucket begins to fill even more, drop by drop, grain of sand by pebble by stone by rock.
Life ebbs, flows, drifts, and rocks.
I just have to see it, and let it fill up my bucket.