To Do Before You Die: Read This Article

You're a type-A list maker. You're going to die. So how should you figure out what to do with the next thirty-plus years of your life?

1) make a list.
2) Or buy a book with the list ready-made -- if you can choose which one!

The Minneapolis Star Tribune's Jon Tevlin looked at the exploding number of books and websites enumerating exactly what people should check off before they're buried:

Such titles, according to psychologists and publishers, are finding readers among baby boomers dragging their Type A attitudes into their golden years as they take stock of their experiences.

As evidence of the crowded market, Tevlin cites the books "Unforgettable Journeys To Take Before You Die," "Unforgettable Places To See Before You Die," "Unforgettable Things To Do Before You Die," and "1,000 Places To See Before You Die." The latter has accompanying calendars and journals.

Unbeknownst to us, there was also a Travel Channel show "99 Things To Do Before You Die," which apparently used to be called "101 Things ..." until, perhaps, they came up two ideas short. After all, after "soak in the mud ... of the Dead Sea," what else is there?

We see no sign of the a slowdown. Just in the last several weeks, the BBC got mileage (or kilometerage?) out of a special titled "50 Films To See Before You Die." In books, September will see the publication of "101 Things To Buy Before You Die;" in January, "101 Things NOT To Do Before You Die." Forthcoming are titles covering paintings to see (1001 of them -- better start early!) and, slightly less exhausting with only 1000 items, another on places to see in just the U.S. and Canada.

One source for the article wondered whether the explosion of the mini-genre reflects fear of future death, or current unhappiness. Other possibilities, in our minds, would be that such lists provide a feeling of gaining control; they also provide the individual with a path ending (they hope) in a feeling of accomplishment.

Or it could be as simple as this: a generation whose time has always been a stretched resource now finds a finite amount of it left. Aging boomers are approaching the problem the same way they might make a "must do" list at the start of an especially busy day. And that might be as deep as the psychology of the "before you die" wavelet goes.

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Here is a sample of Amazon's "Before You Die" books: