Our theme for the month of October is “haunt.”
Apparently I have 119 items in my Reminders app.
This is far too many. It’s an oppressive number.
Granted, most of them are not tasks that I need to complete with any urgency, or that I need to complete at all. Some of them aren’t even tasks. I use the app as a junk drawer for anything that comes to me that I think I might want to remember at some point. Based on the oldest item, I’ve been using it this way since the summer of 2016: in the dusty haze of the Bonnaroo music festival I just had to record our motto for the weekend: whatever the vibes is.
What a wise nugget. Truly worth treasuring these seven years.
This reminder has no deadline set, no action items. It’s just there. And at this point it’s been there long enough that it’s graduated to Nostalgia Status. There are a few other items that have achieved that status scattered amongst the 119: another reminder from 2017 to record my grandma telling the history of a few family heirlooms and a few stories about her sister (my grandma died the following year), a list of weird experiences from the early days of the pandemic (waiting outside of a poorly lit Pizza Hut in DeMotte, Indiana, for a takeout pizza after driving from Virginia with my dad to help my brother evacuate Chicago).
There are also ancient records whose significance has been lost to time, like headstones with long-forgotten names eroded by ages of sleet and moss—such as a four-digit PIN that could either be to an old debit card or someone’s garage. I also wrote down the phrase “Spring has sprang.” What does that mean? Who said it? Any who knew have long since forsaken this place.
I have a handful of jokes in there that I definitely came up with. I guess they came to me in such a rush of brilliance they had to be captured with the urgency of Reminders instead of going into my designated “Funnies” note. My personal favorite:
You might have called me a coward but actually I take that as a compliment because I think it takes a lot of bravery to herd cattle.
Works better out loud…hopefully “coward” sounds like “cowherd.”
In addition to bad jokes, I’ll reach for Reminders in the urgency of a mechanic/oil-change scenario. When the guy rattles off all the things they have done and should do to my car, in a flurry of panic and incomprehension, I’ll attempt to capture enough keywords to reconstruct the information later.
Fuel system cleaning service once a year $140. Transition change $200. Fuel filter. Getting radiator something today. Tune up (spark plug, wires)? Got not synthetic (3000 miles but reminder set for 2500). Got new air filter.
Why is that still there? I don’t even own that car anymore. And there’s not a date attached to it, so even if I did, I would have no clue when I’d be due for my next fuel system cleaning service. It’s just hanging there, eliciting stress and memories of ineptitude every time I scroll past.
There’s also a large percent that are just Ideas For Things I Could Do.
- Wax dye tapestry (a thing I saw on Pinterest in college)
- “Nifty as heck” cross-stitch (I’m guessing that was an inside joke at some point? and I’ve never done cross-stitch)
- Make pot pie
- Make a phone jail
- Iron Giant movie night
- “You can’t sit on your own arse” cross-stitch (a quote from a podcast, and I still don’t do cross-stitch)
- Ride bike (cause sometimes I forget that I own a bike and I need to remind myself to ride my bike)
These haunt me in the way that you’re haunted by a lazy Saturday that gets a little too lazy. The shadow of missed opportunities, of fun not had, of things unmade. I could still do them. But the initial spark of excitement has long since been snuffed out. Adjacent to this category is the Graveyard of Dreams. This includes all of my reminders to practice writing more, actually submit things to journals/websites, cool people I should’ve networked with, conversations I wish I’d initiated, etc. This is the haunting of Ebenezer Scrooge, gazing upon all that he has squandered, worn down by the weight of time and windows of opportunity that have shut.
And while those aren’t pleasant reminders to come across, the true terror, the things that truly haunt me, are…The Actual Tasks.
The ones that need to get done by a certain day, those get done and are deleted. The others…those that are important but not urgent…those linger. Those loom. I run.
Organize closet. Clear fridge. DMV address, credit card, clear voice memos organize desk papers clean ziploc bags read article find necklace buy gifts freeze those bagels pay mom respond to texts respond to responses to my newsletter wash the hand-wash-only clothes plan ten year reunion sew the hole in that bag sew the hole in that jacket find a dentist tithe write some letters make a budget…
These raise a shudder when their notifications go off, sometimes dinging from my phone and then laptop in a brutal one-two jump-scare series of blows that leave me reeling. So I snooze the task for another hour or punt it till the next day. But it follows. Not getting more urgent. Not getting less important. I’m haunted by Things That People Who Have Their Lives Together Should Do.
But good news: in the process of writing this I was able to cross off two things that I forgot I completed! Two down, 117 to go. Or stay… [ominous music and some raven sounds echoing throughout the foggy cemetery with a creepy looking tree off to the right]
Christina Ribbens (’19) graduated with a major in history and minors in studio art and data science. After working in campus ministry for a few years, she’s getting her master’s in public humanities at Georgetown University in Washington, DC. She has a benevolent dependency on tea, is always down for a game of pick-up basketball, and would love to have you over for pancakes sometime.
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UGH you put this so perfectly. I also am haunted by a similar list but mine are in my Notes and Voice Memos apps. One thing I always enjoy about your writing are the specifics you use; they’re so specific that you’d think they wouldn’t be relatable but they DEFINITELY are… “I still don’t do cross stitch”?! SO REAL.
my notes app is where my dreams and aspirations go to die, lol..its an amalgamation of random thoughts i want to remember (potential topic for leadership thing), movies i wanna rewatch (dennis the menace), and people’s names i’m scared to forget (gym guy – Quinton; other gym guy – Joshua).
its beautiful to see i’m not alone:)