“Someday. That’s a dangerous word. It’s really just a code for never,” Roy Miller told June Havens when they met on a flight.

For those of you who don’t remember or don’t know, let me quickly explain who these random names are: Roy Miller and June Havens (Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz) are the protagonists of the decade-old “Knight and Day.”

And although the film begins with this deeply meaningful statement, not sooner than expected, it turns into the entertaining action flick it was always supposed to be. By the end of it, everything falls into place, and a happy ending is upon us.

And that’s okay, that’s what most of us expect, because who wants to watch a film or read a book where there isn’t some sort of closure?

Everyone has enough unfulfilled dreams, emotions, or scenarios in their daily lives to waste their time watching or reading something that will leave them a notch more incomplete. But I guess that’s a different story for another day.

I’ll avoid being absolute by saying that everyone has a someday list lost in a pile of paper in a drawer somewhere, or maybe shoved in forgotten corners of their minds, but a lot of people do—and I am one of them.

Someday, I’ll leave the chaotic, dreadful nine-to-five job that’s been eating away at my life and start my own business or travel the world or simply just take a break to rediscover myself.

Someday, I’ll find the perfect one for me, and I won’t mess it up or run away, or they won’t mess it up or run away.

Someday, I’ll find the strength to stand up and speak out about everything that matters to me and everyone around me.

Someday, I’ll be brave enough to start my own family without dreading I’ll make my partner miserable or royally mess up my kids like some parents so royally mess up theirs (then they grow up, and the cycle continues. But again, that’s a different story for another day).

Whether long or short, most of us have a someday list locked up somewhere—or even parading in plain sight.

For our sanity’s sake, these lists are to keep us calm and comforted that someday we might just build up enough courage to walk away from a job that does nothing for us. It could also be a relationship that has ran its course or any situation that bruises us, or that simply someday things will be bigger and better than what they currently are or were in the past.

Everybody’s list is different and adjusted to their routine and their needs.

And although there are some lucky ones who tick off boxes from their list faster or easier than the rest of us, they still probably wonder what it would be like to be somebody else for a day or own what that someone else owns.

The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.

Of course, for some of us, this list may just be somewhat deeper and darker, maybe more macabre and rather overwhelming. It could be about fighting addiction, illness, or mental health matters. Anything the mind needs time to process and expand to adjust around it—again, for sanity’s sake.

As a person dealing (poorly so far) with anxiety, I hope and pray that someday I will be brave enough to walk down busy streets or have lunch at a crowded restaurant surrounded by strangers and won’t be plagued by thoughts of doom about everything that could possibly go wrong.

Each list is crafted in a safe space, in one’s happy place. It’s revisited each time we think we’re ready and determined to act on it.

Someday, I guess we will.

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