How far back do makers of lists go?

Editor's note: This column originally was published June 6, 2001.

I don't know when, but at some point in life one begins to make written lists of things to do. So far as I know, no one has ever made a study of this. Why would they? It's such a bit of trivia.

I've been wondering at what time in life the change from only mental lists to written lists occurs. I remember a time in my life, as I imagine many do, when lists were only kept in your mind and you didn't miss a beat at getting things done. You just went sailing through all the things you meant to do in orderly precision. At the end of the day you didn't even marvel that you got it all done.

If I had to guess, I'd say the change is made somewhere during the middle years of one's life. Those middle years! They just keep shifting upward. We used to think the 30s and 40s were the middle years. No longer! With life expectancy always moving upward, the middle years move right along in tandem. Perhaps the middle years are now the 60s. But I know a lot of 60-year-olds who still move on through their days without having to consult a list of things to do.

I think I can pinpoint the time when I switched from only mental listing to written lists. It started before my middle years. I was working in an insurance agency and one of the companies supplied me with a beautiful, little, leather-bound memo book. There it was, every day of the year marked at the top of the page and about 20 lines to list the things to do that day. It seemed such a waste not to use the little book for the purpose it was intended. So on one Monday, I wrote in it, "Wash clothes." I think this was because I'd just finished a cross-stitched Sunbonnet Baby sampler that showed the little characters washing clothes on an old-fashioned wash board, beneath which was the cross-stitched reminder, "Monday, wash." Then followed "Tuesday, Iron," "Wednesday, mend," and so on through the week. Eventually I began to put some notations below these major activities such as:

1. Get some Satina to put in starch.

2. Wipe the clotheslines with steel wool.

3. Fold sheets, don't iron.

And so forth. If one just kept all the lists he/she has made, it would sort of be a biography.

Those who keep daily journals tell me that some days their entries are like:

1. Mail check to AmerenUE.

2. Get detergent.

3. Return books to library.

4. Call Mary.

I must admit I'm falling into that habit. When I first started my journals there would be great paragraphs describing the merry sound of the little goldfinches as they feasted on the henbit patch gone to seed or the long shafts of morning sunshine coming through the window to rest on the gold hands of the shelf clock. Now such brief entries may be:

1. Get bird seed.

2. Get AA batteries for the shelf clock.

I don't know how far back the list makers go in history. Could the first list have been:

1. Make light.

2. Make a firmament.

3. Make dry land appear.

REJOICE!

Jean Bell Mosley is an author and longtime resident of Cape Girardeau.