We use the lists to categorize and systematize things. And because the things which can be categorized and systematized are unlimited by number, that’s why the lists are an open set. Many of them can have a quite boring content like, for example, the lists an acquaintance of mine makes in order to plan her time minute by minute while on a four-day trip abroad. Her lists look like this:
Paris (23 – 27 May)
23 May
8:00 – 8:30 Waking up and performing habitual morning hygiene activities
8:33 Calling home to tell my parents that I have woken up
8:45 – 9:30 Taking public transportation to the first site of interest scheduled for the day
9:30 – 12:30 Going to the Louvre (if it rains) or the Tuileries Gardens (if it doesn’t rain)
12:33 Calling home to tell my parents that I have visited The Louvre (or the Tuileries Gardens)
12:35 – 13:00 Lunch with the sandwiches I have brought with me from Bulgaria while I am at
The Louvre (if it rains), or eat them on a bench in the Tuileries Gardens (if it doesn’t rain)
And so on.
Or let’s take the shopping lists:
fabric softener
green peppers
eggs
a bottle of mastic
effervescent aspirin
And so on.
There are, however, lists, which may prove crucial for the future course of one’s life. These are pros-and-cons lists. And I am giving an example.
Pros and cons marrying John
Pros: Cons:
Has beautiful hair His father and his brothers are bald!!
Has an apartment in the city center I’d rather live in the country
Not a go-getter; enjoys a lot of free time Terribly unambitious
Handsome David is more handsome
And so on.
However, when you are pushing your 40’s, more fundamental existential questions start piling at your door and you can’t help but thinking “Is it possible that I would have been happier as a shepherd than as a teacher in arts and crafts to retarded kids?” Or the ever classical question: “Where does the Universe end?” with its sub-question: “Why am I on this earth and am I alive for real, or I am only a projection of the idea of myself?” Of course, such vagaries of the mind cannot be solved only by making a list. Let’s not forget that many wise people, like Plato, for example, in their lifetime filled thousands of pages with words and not with lists trying to resolve the mysteries behind these questions and yet, they were not able to arrive to any valid, or at least sensible explanation whatsoever!
The list which I started a week ago (and is still not quite finished) has for its purpose to classify and organize my personal movable and immovable property, which is, I guess, some sort of balance-sheet the need for which surfaced as the middle-age crisis is expected to knock on my door any day now.
Here is the list:
What I have: What I don’t have:
½ apartment the other ½ of the apartment
a vicious cat a living creature of some form, which, if given a handful of coins could go by itself to the bakery and by a bun or something for itself
2 boring girlfriends 2 interesting girlfriends
a sister who lives 4000 km away other relatives
too much free time an idea what to do with my free time
a broken laptop a vast wine-cellar
bad mood patience
I’ve stopped here, because I fear that the right column will severely outgrow the left one.
For I don’t have also many things. Like, for example…I don’t have… I don’t have a… Wait a minute! Actually, I didn’t have my period this month! Which can only mean two things – that I either prematurely entered the menopause, or that I urgently need to find the number of that cute plumber who came to fix the leak in the bathroom, but didn’t leave before the morning after.
