Oct 01 2008
The Notebook
There’s a notebook that sits near the kitchen door, on the counter under the telephone. If we have to know a sports schedule quick this is where we would look. If we need a phone number, we might look here. Take out menus, postcards inviting us to community events and the The Church Bulletin can all be found between its covers.
The book is, of course, an ordinary 3-ring binder leftover from my husband’s high school days. It is divided into catagories, and sometimes the content being added is punched, though often not. “The Notebook” is a proper noun, just like its first-page-contents The Church Bulletin. Why? It gives an air of importance that these two items deserve. If the answer can’t be found in The Notebook or The Church Bulletin, then, where do we look?
Our days, our weeks and sometimes is seems, our lives, are lived based on the content of The Notebook. Will we eat supper together? No, Teenage Daughter has a field hockey game an hour’s drive from here. Will we sleep late on Sunday? Not this week. Most Wonderful Mate is lectoring at the 8 AM Mass. Need a substitute for Eucharistic Adoration? The list of phone numbers hangs out in section one (Church) along with the Altar Server Schedule. Want to know who borrowed a particular home-school textbook? Check that crossed out and corrected page w-a-a-a-y at the back of The Notebook.
The Notebook is really a very ordinary thing, but it safeguards little and big pieces of paper that might otherwise be lost in the shuffle of daily life. It helps put family members on an even playing field regarding upcoming events that affect the household. Much like the calendar that hangs in the cupboard, important information is at one’s fingertips,but more importantly, these schedules are primary sources, free from the error of Mom’s transcribing to the calendar.
The Notebook: sometimes things are piles on top of it; sometimes things are shoved under it. Ocasionally the phone cord catches on the edge of the cover and a crash is heard. But without it, the uniform might not be clean when it is needed, or the priest might be missing an altar server. It’s a system that works for us.
