There’s a drawer in my desk filled with things I keep meaning to get around to. A few letters I should have answered months ago, scraps of paper with ideas scribbled on them, photographs I intended to sort, and a notebook I bought because I liked the cover and was certain I would find something worthwhile to put inside it.
I opened that drawer this morning looking for a paper clip and ended up spending twenty minutes going through its contents. I never found the paper clip.
I did find a list I’d written some time ago. Nothing particularly ambitious, just a collection of ordinary things I wanted to accomplish. A few books to read, something I wanted to learn, places I thought might be interesting to visit. There were even a couple of ideas for articles, although I couldn’t remember what had prompted them in the first place.
It occurred to me that I’ve probably spent a remarkable portion of my life making lists of things I intend to do.
I’ve always been rather fond of lists. There’s something satisfying about getting an idea out of your head and putting it somewhere you can find it again. Of course, finding it again seems to be the part I haven’t quite mastered.
I wonder how many good intentions are sitting in drawers, tucked between the pages of books, or buried somewhere in the notes on our computers. Little reminders of the people we thought we might become, the things we wanted to try, and the interests that briefly occupied our attention before something else came along.
Some of those interests deserved more of our time. Others probably seemed like good ideas only because we’d had an unusually productive morning and were feeling optimistic about our abilities.
I once thought I should learn to play the piano. I still think it would be wonderful to sit down and play something without having to hunt for middle C. But apparently wanting to play the piano and wanting to spend several years learning how are two entirely different things.
That’s another thing about growing older. You begin to recognize the difference between what genuinely interests you and what merely sounds interesting.
When we’re younger, we tend to imagine there will be plenty of time for everything. We can put something aside because next year will do just as well. There will always be another spring, another opportunity, another afternoon when nothing more pressing requires our attention.
And generally, there is.
Until one day you realize that some of the things you’ve been saving for later have been waiting an awfully long time.
I don’t find that thought particularly depressing. If anything, it makes me a little more selective about how I spend my days. I no longer feel obligated to finish every book I start or pursue every idea that crosses my mind. Some things are perfectly enjoyable for the brief time they interest us. They don’t have to become lifelong accomplishments to have been worthwhile.
Still, there are a few things I haven’t been able to put aside. They keep turning up in unexpected places, sometimes years after I first thought of them. An idea for a story, an old photograph, a subject I want to know more about. I suppose those are the ones worth paying attention to.
Perhaps that’s how we recognize what matters to us. Not by how enthusiastically we begin something, but by how often we find ourselves returning to it.
I put most of the papers back in the drawer, some I threw away, a few went into a folder where, with any luck, I’ll actually be able to find them again.
But I kept the old notebook on my desk.
It’s been sitting there all morning, its pages still empty. I haven’t decided what to write in it yet, although I have several possibilities.
For once, I think I’ll resist the temptation to make a list of them.
~Deborah