Sylvia's Journal

For more than 2 decades we have kept our lives organized using what now seems an old fashioned appointment book. Every year in October I order the new Anselm Adams engagement book. This is our favorite, not just because of the wonderful pictures of the American landscape but also because of the way it is laid out. From October to December we have two books going. And then, in January we relegate the old one to a box with other memorabilia. We have kept them there mostly out of nostalgia for things past. It holds another year of our life. Sometimes we go back into that box to help us refresh our memories about something we have done in the past.  

Now, the calendar is like a wasteland, sitting unused on the counter with page after page of whiteness. The March weeks still have a number of entries, and then it is blank, except for the occasional things I planned month in advance, like our trip to Holland in April, a trip to a friend’s wedding in May, and some other gatherings that required travel and advance bookings.

Gone are the appointments for doctor, PT, massage and dentist visits, dinners with friends, concerts, plays, lectures, etc.  If this calendar is kept with the old ones in a box and no one throws it away after we are gone, it may tell a story of idleness, of nothingness.

But of course, nothing is further from the truth. We are very busy but everything is now only marked on our electronic calendars. For years we struggled to keep the atom and byte calendars synchronized, with mixed success. Now that problem has gone away. We don’t have to chide or blame each other for not marking something in the appointment book and missing an appointment that required payment for the no-show. This is one of the many layers of the new abnormal that is revealing itself to us. More to come, no doubt.