Running a tight ship. Magically getting it all done. Type A personality. Everything has a place & everything in its place. A Pottery Barn house. Not me. So not me, particularly post-chemo with not a hormone in sight to glue it all together in the old memory bank. Consequently, I'm taking an Executive Functioning webinar, trying to re-train my brain in the ways of time management and using visible tools daily. It's helpful to have daily, weekly, monthly, and long-term planning pages in front of me -- as long as I remember to use them.
Early yesterday morning, I had created the perfect do-able list: take boys to school, meet workers at the house to get gas fire place working, write the Hump Day Short, grab lunch, buy humidfiers and toothbrushes, get home for webinar, pick up boys & take them to play dates, buy groceries, reverse pick up of boys, make quick taco dinner, have dinner together, get boys to bed at a decent hour.
Well, plans change in my non-Pottery Barn life. The best goof-up in my schedule was lunch. I stopped at a little restaurant that I had recently discovered; I'm usually there at odd times but yesterday I as there at noon. I sat down with my planning clipboard and a blank piece of paper (aka: grocery-list-in-the-making) as diners filtered in.
I recognized one woman as the mom of a Little Leaguer that played on Liam's team. And another as the mom of a little girl in my god-daughter's class. Long story short, we slid my table together with another and had lunch together. We chatted, laughed, joked, and poked. For not remembering either of their names nor ever having met the third woman, the conversation was lively. Enjoyable.
So if you felt the world brighten a bit around 12 Eastern time yesterday, it may have been the sparks from that lunch. Why won't you take your child bowling? Roller-skating? Should an inmate on death-row receive cancer treatment? When should you pay a contractor? Why was my Christmas wreath on the door until March 6th? (See the 1st and 2nd paragraph... and there WILL be new decor on my door TODAY! ...I'm putting it on my daily planner.)
Alas, much like the rest of the day's events, lunch went on longer than I had allowed in my planner. "Inhale lunch" then "Write Hump Day Short at library" then "Webinar at home." I skipped the middle task to get the next one done.
So, I'm writing the Hump Day Short at 5 a.m. And happily so. Lunch with these ladies and another surprise visit with old friends were the highlights of my day. Conversations when plans change.
I didn't have "Lunch with virtual strangers" nor "Unexpected chat with old friends" written in on my daily planning sheet.
Perhaps that's why I plan my day in pencil?
Happy Hump Day.