I’m completely unfocused, terribly distracted and the complete opposite of a one track mind.  This is why I will always live and die by “the planner.”  It’s as simple as this: if  I do not write it down, it will not happen.

I plan so that I can control the way my day plays out.  First, I make a list of things I have to do.  Then, I fill in the time slots on my iCal.  I print out a hard copy if I’ll be home most of the day, or carry around my iPhone if I’ll be out.  Minute by minute, task by task my day unfolds.  As each scheduled item is accomplished, I either cross it out in pen with a flourish of satisfaction or scroll down to see what’s next.

Only the day never quite unfolds exactly how I want.  So, I’m sure to reschedule items as the need comes up.

Did I mention that I’m a stay at home wife and mother?  That I’m not the CEO of a Fortune 500 company?  My planned out day consists of when I’ll wash the dishes, do the laundry, clean out a closet, pay some bills, play with my daughter, and all of the other stuff that stay at home moms do.

I get made fun of quite a bit for keeping such meticulous records of my day.  But, people, you don’t understand, I have to do this.  If I don’t, I’ll wander through the day with only half of what I was supposed to do actually getting accomplished.  I’ll sink into bed at night thinking that this day meant nothing, and that I did nothing all day long.  I’ll snap at my husband when he, with every good intention in his heart, asks, “So, what did you do today?”

Because when it’s all said and done, I don’t get to deposit a paycheck in the bank that tells me that I performed satisfactorily.  I need the people around me to know that I did something today.  I need myself to believe that I did something today.

Most days, I check off every single thing I have planned.  I should feel like a million bucks, right?  I mean, I did do everything I set out to do.

But the truth is, I don’t feel like a million bucks.  At all.

It dawns on me that the planner is never going to resolve that aching feeling that I’m not accomplishing everything I set out to do.  Not today, and not in my life.  I look at my planner and I wonder how anything I’ve written has anything to do with who I want to be.  Of course, any and all time spent with my child and husband is excluded from that last sentiment.

But the dishes, the laundry, the dinner, the bills, the mopping… this is not who I am.

It is not who I want to be.  For all the control the planner affords, it’s not helping me control this feeling, at all.