A while ago it got into my mind that my days would suddenly become a beacon of productivity and happily accomplished tasks if only I would find a way to keep a list of all my varied activities so I have a clear image of what I need to do in a particular day, week, etc. I do prefer digital technology to paper mostly because it is less wasteful and because I’m in front of the computer most of the time anyway, so I wouldn’t need to have another thing to keep track of.

But such is the life of the modern person: full of technological high hopes and disappointments. It turned out that digital calendars are not as perfect as they set out to be. They seem too immaterial, too easy to disregard, and at the same time too serious. Too stressful and yet at the same time too fickle. They are not beautiful. Not tactile. And maybe most importantly, they seem to always look only in the present and toward the future, and don’t allow you much of the pleasure of leafing back through the pages of what you have done already. Maybe some do, I just never found my way to using that function. Anyway.

That was when I remembered my old agenda. This is an object that has been very loved. I remember seeing it in passing in the windows of a stationery store on one of the old streets of Bucharest. I couldn’t take my mind of it for days. It was expensive for me then so I had to really think about it before taking the plunge. But in the end I couldn’t resist and I went back to the store to buy it. It has a tapestry fabric cover and a really good size, somewhere in between what you’d consider a “personal size” planner and a “desk size” one. I used it for many years and carried it with me to US when I moved here. It stopped carrying it around in my purse long time ago, because like everyone else I would rather reduce the weight I carry on my shoulder every day. Even though I am still pulled toward large bags, I would prefer to keep them more empty than full these days. (Yes, of course. Come on, stop it, you don’t need to beg. A “what’s in my bag” post will be coming very soon.)

I pulled out this old agenda from the shelf and put in some dates on a few pages to start using it as a planner. I did that for a week or two before deciding that I definitely and badly wanted a new planner. Like a nice leather bound one. Because I’m fancy like that. No, not really. But leather feels like something strong, beautiful and durable. It doesn’t get dirty, it looks better with age, it lasts forever. My old tapestry binder looks its age: dirty and cracking all around the edges of the fake leather interior. I am going to give it a nice warm soapy bath one of these days, because I’m not ready to let it go. Yet. Although it’s probably time. As you will see.

Once I convinced myself that I needed a new planner (well, a little before that, let’s be honest here) I started to look online for options and of course stumbled upon the Filofax mania that seems to be going around. Apparently, more than a few people find it hard to let go of paper planning than I would have thought. Those planners look beautiful and seem to be made of quality materials (except for the rings, which have problems, as everyone seems to be complaining). I thought for five seconds of a nice purple one to match my existing collection of purple office accoutrements (which has happened completely by accident until now). But I don’t know if a leather cover with some metal rings is worth such a high price. I do like the look of worn and long-loved ones that carry the deep, hidden stories of their owners’ lives. If I were to ever get one, I would go for an A5 size of The Original Retro Navy.

But this time I tried to find something at a thrift store. It didn’t happen, though. The thrift gods did not smile upon me. So I decided to check out Ebay. Where I found it. My new planner. Handcrafted in the USA. Some sort of basket weave stamped leather. Pretty cute and pretty cheap (about $23 including shipping). It even had a label according to which it had belonged to the Disney Studios, which seems like a fun pedigree.

I was unsure about the size for a very long time and quite disappointed when it arrived and seemed much smaller than I had imagined. The seller had listed dimensions around 6 inches wide and 8 inches long, but it is less than 51/2 wide or 71/2 long. I set it up anyway. Bought some 5×7 notebooks with perforations so that the pages could be ripped off easily, and I punched holes to fit the rings. And voila, new planner for me. It has been working great. I have even made my peace with the size. I don’t really need anything bigger than that for now.

And once that conclusion was reached, on my following thrift shop stop I found a nice, big leather planner in perfect shape for only $2. Of course, right? That always happens. I had to get that too. I don’t know yet what its use it going to be. It’s clearly too big for me to use for my daily planning. But it’s beautiful so I’m keeping it around for the future. I’m sure it will come in handy one day. Maybe when I return to employed work and I want to look very professional.

This is the saga of my planners. Aren’t you happy you now know all that? I’m sure. Oh, no! Please! Don’t worry. It was nothing, really. Anytime. (Seriously. I’m not joking. Run away from here now!)

P.S. I thought I’d add here, for fun additional reading, The Spooky Story of the Paper Planner’s Unusual Life, as reported by The New York Times through the years.

First there were the good year:

(1987) Organizing pays off at Filofax, in which we find out that the Filofax had become “a cult product among the upwardly striving professional classes worldwide, earning it the nickname of ‘the yuppie handbook.’ ”

(1995) Filofax, 80’s Talisman, Thrives in Too-Busy 90’s, in which the Filofax chief executive at the time says that the company’s success is due to the fact that “people, particularly women who have to organize both families and business careers, lead increasingly hectic lives and are looking for something to help them do it.”

And then the sudden end:

(May 7, 2010) The Demise of Datebooks, in which the author grieves after shelving her Filofax to move to “a calendar program that seems somehow to flatten existence.”

But wait! Is this a zombie or ghost that we’re seeing?

(July 29, 2011) A Paper Calendar? It’s 2011, in which the author, after forgetting her planner in the office and facing a whole weekend without it, considers the conversion to an electronic calendar and declares “I would rather live a life of 1,000 missed appointments.”