We’re in the final month of this year and we all know what that means. No, not the hustle and bustle of the Christmas season, although I’ve got plenty on my plate there, too. I’m talking about the really important matter: New calendars. I realize this makes me terribly old fashioned, but I do not like keeping track of my life on my phone or my computer or some other electronic device. I am old school. I like jotting things on the appropriate square, in pencil if the plan might change and in ink if it’s pretty much set in stone. My folks, like everyone I knew, kept a calendar hanging on the wall. Ours was in the kitchen, readily accessible to everyone. My mother was the calendar keeper, although my dad wrote on it from time to time. She started at the first of the year writing in family birthdays and other occasions of note. Those clean pages, unmarked as the new year began, soon filled up. Our lives were recorded on that calendar. Everything from the occasional doctor’s appointment to the band practices and concerts, trips to the farm supply store and visits with the family were recorded there. We lived in the country. My mother’s relatives lived in the city, Toledo, to be exact. While we lived on a state highway, so travel wasn’t bad, we are talking the era of two-lane roads and we didn’t hop in the car and take off willy-nilly. My mother and my favorite aunt would need a couple of phone calls back and forth to figure out the best time for us to go into the land of streetlights and taxi cabs. The dance of my aunt’s work schedule, the school events of all us kids and my dad’s time in the field was often intricate. But once that date was set, my mother wrote it on the calendar and circled it. That meant no way, no how, was The Plan going to be canceled. Our city relatives came to visit us, of course, but that wasn’t as big a deal. They would usually come to call on a Sunday afternoon and the day was casual. When we went into town to visit my aunt, the trip always involved shopping at the big department stores downtown. We loved going over the high-rise bridge across the Maumee River, the quickest way from my aunt’s house to the city center. And the stores ... well, we didn’t have anything like them where we usually shopped. These stores were multi-story with both elevators and escalators, and each one had its own restaurant. My young self thought was the classiest thing ever and couldn’t wait until lunch time. We had a wall calendar, too, until my kids were grown. Then there weren’t as many events to record. And now, with social media, I can scroll through and find posts and pictures of everything significant in my life. Yet I have a desk calendar, although the name has changed. The new title is planner, even though the thing is divided by months and weeks. The purpose is the same, to keep track of what’s coming up and, if I choose, to record things that have happened. I am in the process of switching over from last year’s flower-fronted planner to a lovely mauve and gold one for 2023. I am dutifully writing down birthdays, appointments and plans for the coming months. And here’s what is cool: Unlike our old wall calendars, this one comes with stickers to mark whatever I want. There are tiny arrows with words like “top priority,” “to do”, “important”and “meeting.” There are little flowery circles to call attention to a daily square and teeny gold airplanes, birthday cakes, balloons and scissors (to mark hair appointments, I presume.” My favorite of these stickers is the exclamation point. I don’t know what I’ll use one for, but rest assured, this will be something as exciting as lunch at that old department store.
