I tried and failed for years to keep a journal. I bought each one with the best of intentions and looked forward to being able to reflect on or cringe at my daily ruminations years later. I always started out like a house on fire, writing pages and pages at a time before eventually petering out as I got too busy living life to take time to record it. The premise of Listography seemed much more manageable, however. Instead of taking several hours to wax poetic on the events of the day, all I would have to do was take few minutes to jot down three responses to the daily topic.
Concerts I’d Time Travel to. Most Memorable Smells. Books That Influenced Me. Questions for the Universe. Listography, you had me at “hello.”
My only New Year’s resolution this year was to create a better work/life balance. At the end of 2018, my wife Dita and I were spending more time apart than together since she had a new job that required her to commute to work instead of working remotely in our dining room and I was working an average of six days a week to help the four-person team I manage catch up on a backlog of cases. On January 1, I resolved to make a concerted effort to spend more time working on my bucket list and less time looking at my to-do list.
I bought Listography in mid-February. I began that day’s list as soon as I got home. Or at least I tried to. The talking point for the day was Weird Things I Do. Naturally, I couldn’t think of any because nothing I do is weird. Dita, on the other hand, begged to differ. We spent a lazy Sunday afternoon laughing over things I think are perfectly normal but she thinks are a bit unusual. Doesn’t everyone put their beer in the freezer for twenty minutes to make sure it’s ice cold before they drink it? Okay, maybe it’s just me. But at least I’m not the only writer I know who can’t begin a new manuscript without selecting a title first. I see you, Carsen Taite. I see you. As for occasionally centering text in my head when I’m stressed the way I used to do in typing class a hundred years ago, yeah, I admit that might be a little out there.
Dita and I had so much fun working on the first list we decided to tackle the previous days’ topics as well. It has quickly become a new tradition. We work on a list between commercial breaks on one of our favorite TV shows or mute the sound on the nightly news to focus on New Restaurants to Try or Values to Focus on This Year instead of the latest machinations in Washington, DC.
It’s funny to realize that a book I initially thought was going to be all about me is slowly morphing into one that’s all about us. Something to add to the list of little things I appreciate. What do you mean I only get three entries? Then I guess it’s time to make a new list.