344. To Do

Unlike normal people’s “To Do” list, mine does not shrink nor boast heavy charcoal lines striping through mundane tasks. No. My list grows, like a weed that you thought might be a plant but have now confirmed (after a quick Google search on a “no computer” day) is, in fact, a weed after all. A weed that needs absolutely no water, no food, no sunshine, nothing—yet, this weed (my “To Do” list) grows and grows and grows and towers over the “real” plants, the ones you paid good money to have a landscaper put in.

Okay, enough with the out-of-control weed metaphor. You get the idea.

As soon as I write down an item, I think of four more “related” items that should be added to the list. The main problem with my list is: it is not really even my list. It is the list of Tall and Short and The Husband and Kitty (“make vet appointment—yearly check-up”). Back when I was young and single and unencumbered by children and Adult Responsibilities (hello, Mortgage!), I could write a quick list and (miracle!) get a couple things, maybe even most (maybe even all) accomplished in a relatively finite amount of time (for example: one day).

Now, I am lucky if I can do even one thing on the list, let alone all 500 of them. It has gotten so depressing to look at “The List” that now I find myself writing things on it that I have just done solely for the thrill of being able to cross something off (“drink coffee” found its way onto yesterday’s list).

Sometimes, right when I wake up in the morning, I will go into the study and optimistically take out the list just to see if perhaps something got accomplished in the middle of the night while I was sleeping (nope—“buy new batteries for kitchen smoke detector” still remains on the list, undone).

Lately, I have been on this kick to clean out all my closets and drawers. Again, this is not just MOV’s personal list, this list is done by me but involves doing the work of four family members and a cat. So, that means it is not only my closet. My list says

• Front coat closet (and each member of the family owns no fewer than 62 coats)
• Entry hall table (amazing how much you can cram into five little drawers and forget that it was ever there until you need to file your taxes)
• Linen closet
• My closet
• My dresser
• Tall and Short’s closet (luckily, a shared space)
• Laundry room (yes, it seems like a blessing to have an entire room devoted to laundry … until that room fills up with miscellaneous junk that you don’t know what to do with)
• Closet in study
• Closet in kids’ playroom (full of expensive toys they never play with but you can’t bear to part with and are holding onto for no good reason)
• Pantry shelves in kitchen
• Guest room closet (if something didn't fit in the laundry room, then it has traveled across the hall to this location) 
• Storage closet (already too full to fit excess stuff from laundry room or guest room)
• And the grande dame of storage closets: the garage (which has not housed an actual vehicle in over a year, but instead is home to more useful items like free rowing machines and abandoned pianos)

Add to this fun list the equally fun tasks of “buy milk” and “mail Kim’s birthday present” and “email Short’s teacher” and “make dentist appointment for Tall”; you can see how the list never goes away.

Well, at least I wrote today’s blog (oops, I’ll have to go back and add it to the list so I can cross it off).

MOV