Long Live the Legal Pad

Current wisdom says that to manage information overload, we should all go paperless.  I’ve made many digital conversions that have been life changing.  I’m devoted to my online calendar (love those alerts!), I never misplace the shopping lists on my phone, and I’ve happily ditched unfoldable paper maps.  But I’ll never abandon the legal pad.

Yes, I can type notes on my computer or phone, but there’s something about a blank legal pad that opens up a world of possibilities.  Ideas flow, plans are hatched, projects are born.  Maybe it's that I grew up writing by hand, not typing from toddlerhood, that my mind connects more closely with a pen than a keyboard.  

Now, full disclosure: This post is being typed, not handwritten.  Why?  Because it’s flowing easily, and I can pretty much download it from my head to my laptop.  Where the legal pad comes in is with stuff that’s confounding, bewildering, or otherwise gobsmacking.  I.e, when I’m stuck.  It’s then that I need those yellow lined pages in my hand, coaxing me to put down something, pray, anything.  A blank computer screen can paralyze me with its incessantly blinking cursor.  The legal pad gently prods me to get started.

The ideas that are keepers eventually get typed into a computer file.  Most of my handwritten notes end up in the recycling bin.  But it's the act of writing them down that resets my intentions and gets me going on that new, hopeful path. 

Subscribing to Overload

When I launched my consulting business, I earnestly subscribed to two business magazines.  Now when they arrive each month, I dutifully…hurl them on a pile of business magazines.

Most days I love getting magazines – give me the latest Real Simple and I’m in lifestyle nirvana.  But these business mags make me clench up. 

Each cover promises the key to my success.  Some sample headlines:

“How to Network Your Way to Fame & Fortune”

“How to Be an Extraordinary Leader”

“How to Ace Social Media”

“How to Get Good at Making Money”

See a pattern?  Each of these articles should teach me something useful, right?  One would think.  Instead, I’ll learn about all the things I’m doing wrong or should add to my to-do list.  Frankly, I can’t take the pressure.

Genetically, I’m a read-everything-I-can-get-my-hands-on-so-that-I-can-prepare-for-every-scenario kind of girl.  But these articles get me so worked up that I can’t move forward. 

So what to do with this growing pile of publications?  How ‘bout I give each one ten minutes (I’ll set a timer) and forbid myself to tear out articles, take notes, or otherwise act upon what I’ve read.  Instead, I’ll trust that this brain of mine will absorb the good stuff.  And I might even do something with it someday.

The Conservation of Precious Objects

When I graduated college, a friend of mine was continuing on to a masters program called The Conservation of Precious Objects.  She wanted to become one of those museum people who keeps fine art from crumbling into oblivion.  Bless her.

We don’t have any fine art around our house, but you’d never know it from my family photo neurosis.  Since my memory is so bad, our digital and printed pictures are like holy relics.  How will I know what my kids looked like as babies if I don’t have photographic evidence?  I live in fear that one (or all) of the following will obliterate our photos: a house fire, a computer crash, a back-up hard drive crash, iCloud evaporation, my failure to use 100% acid free storage boxes.  I could go on.

Back in the olden days, people were lucky to have one photo of their family.  Today, we have thousands, and the chances of them all disappearing are slim.  Still, I’ve kept our photos squirreled away in a guestroom closet, afraid that by handling them I’d somehow mess them up.  That closet mocked me for years until I finally couldn’t take it anymore.  I hauled out all the boxes and scrapbooks, and I started to sort.  Surprisingly, the photos did not spontaneously combust.  And in an act of uncharacteristic bravery, I decided our photos were meant to be looked at, not hidden away in the name of conservation.  So.  I am slowly bringing out some of the best pictures for display.  And I plan to throw a bunch into scrapbooks, even if I'm incapable of doing anything with stickers and pretty paper.

I know I sound like a nutcase.  Most people don’t get this worked up over snapshots.  But it’s one of my little quirks, and until they develop a Twelve Step program for this one, I’m on my own.  In the meantime, I'm going to demote our photos to semi-precious objects.  The people they depict are the true treasures.