Because I haven’t been sitting down to write my Monday blog posts on Sundays, it seems like it’s getting later and later in the day on Mondays when I’m getting them posted. Part of that is sometimes a lack of an idea for something to post, but part of it is that Monday mornings are always busy. Yes, even for someone who works from home and can arrange my schedule any way I want to. From more than thirty years of routines that involved the week’s activities starting on Monday (school, working, working + school), even after a year of self-employment, Monday is the day to sit down and look to see what needs to be accomplished in the next five days. It’s much ado about the to-do list.

When I was first laid off last year (August 1 marked the one-year anniversary of my official unemployment date), I kept tons of lists: places I needed to contact, or go, about unemployment and benefits stuff; things I needed to take care of financially; jobs I applied for; editors to contact about freelance work; things I already had scheduled that I needed to remember to do/go to; things I could do around the house to keep myself busy; daily housekeeping activities to keep my home in order; and friends I wanted to set up lunch dates with to make sure I was getting out of the house regularly.

Once I grew more comfortable with the idea that I wasn’t immediately going to plunge back into another full-time, outside-the-house job and certain things started falling into a routine, I stopped making a weekly to-do list. Because I wasn’t being overwhelmed with freelance projects—but had them coming in at a somewhat slow but regular pace—I could keep up with them by setting reminders on the e-mails so that I’d get a pop-up to remind me of the due dates. I knew when my books were due. And because of budgetary restrictions, I started staying home more and going out less.

But, after five or six months of this, certain things started to fall by the wayside, like the daily housekeeping tasks or making sure I get out of the house regularly—and more than just going to the grocery store a couple of times a week to pick up one or two things. I’m still getting things done that must get done: the freelance work, preparing for the workshops I teach each month for MTCW, and (usually) my daily writing goal. But sometimes, other stuff falls through the cracks, simply because it isn’t top of mind. Like writing reading-group questions for Ransome’s Honor (which reminds me to say, if you’ve read it and you have some ideas for group discussion questions for it please e-mail me!!!). Submitting an expense report. Following up on reader e-mails. Actively looking for ways/places to market my books, for book signing or speaking opportunities. Staying in touch with friends, more than just reading their status updates on Facebook and letting that suffice. Reading. Exercising. Cooking. Etc. (I’m just remembered that I’m getting really bad about forgetting to take my blood-pressure pills first thing in the morning.)

I’m writing this in a break from finishing up a freelance editing project (a great book about divorce recovery which could easily have been slightly tweaked to be a book on recovering from getting laid off), which is what made me think about the fact that I need to reorganize my life and start keeping a to-do list again, not only to stay on top of everything, but for my own mental health. Because I’ve noticed I’ve been feeling more and more like I’m on the downward slope into depression (I suffer from cyclical depression)—mostly because of the vast amount of amorphous “things I should be doing” hanging over me which I am not doing. And getting organized this week is going to be even more important because I have a meeting with the head of a small publishing house who wants me to start doing some freelance administrative work for her company. (And I’m thrilled at the prospect. Believe it or not, I actually miss doing administrative work. It’s very rewarding, because it’s the kind of work that doesn’t eat into the part of my mental stores reserved for writing, the way editing sometimes does.) So as soon as I finish this project and get it sent off, I’ll be sitting down to write my to-do list for the week. And I’m thinking I may get out one of those blank journal-style books I have (because I can’t help myself but buy them occasionally) and use that for keeping my lists. Either that, or I may move my whiteboard back into the office from the kitchen (where I currently use it to plan my meals for the week) and use that. Or just buy another one eventually.

Do you make to-do lists? If you don’t, how do you keep track of everything you need to accomplish during the day/week?