its a mad mission

In the past, I’ve talked about my obsession with names, and found that a number of you could relate (Melissa and I even discovered we had both named cars “The Silver Bullet”). So now, dear readers, it’s time to see how many of you are likeminded on another topic: list-making.

You know who you are.

Every Sunday night (or Monday morning) I list out everything to do for the week. I have a day planner (sorry, this is where I go waaayyy lo-tech—yes, I know about the iphone, and no, I don’t want one). One week takes up two pages, and on each day I list out any regular engagements, stuff that I remember needs to be done that day, etc. As I go through the week, it sits 6 inches from my left hand while I’m at my desk, or on the counter that functions as our apartment’s hub. Anything that comes up, whether it’s going out or purposefully spending a night at home, it goes in there. It’s my brain dump. For someone who naturally obsesses just a tad too much about life, this helps me not obsess. Once it’s written down my mind can let go of it.

I come by this habit honestly, though. I distinctly remember my dad sitting down on Sunday nights, Dayrunner in hand, writing out his list for the week. Our family also had a dry-erase board over our dining room table for the purpose of lists (and homeschooling). It was always full on Saturday work-around-the-house days (Jason and I had honey-do lists long before either of us ever got married).

But the best part of this whole list-making lifestyle: CROSSING SOMETHING OFF.

The back half of my planner is not a nice chronicle of my year. Rather, it’s a series of blots, hashes and scratches that firmly state “This is done.” It’s horribly ugly but horribly satisfying. My planner provides daily moments of glee whenever a task is obscured by a big fat pen mark.

And I will admit that I’m a bit of a crossing-it-off cheater. If something doesn’t get done in a day, I don’t leave it. I cross it off and move it to the next day–it’s a joint moment of happiness (yay, crossed it off!) and depression (tomorrow’s list just got longer).

So there you have it, a glimpse into my list-making soul. Anyone else have lists of lists? Please share…

Oh, and p.s.: Bill caught the vision and recently bought a dayplanner. Now I can cross THAT off my list.