As I rummaged through the closet looking for something that I can’t even remember, I stumbled upon my Filofax.  Yes, I did say Filofax. 

 For those born in the 21^st century, it’s a small looking folder that contains a calendar, day planner, notepad, plastic sleeves, ruler, pen holder, calculator, etc…  Basically it’s a personal organizer that helps you to manage your time, appointments, meetings and tasks.

 It’s really a folder that you write down all the things you need or want to do on a given day and reference it when you can’t recall what it is you were supposed to do. 

 Back in the 90’s it was a real popular thing to have but I resisted the urge to have one because I felt it “dumbed” you down and made you prone to not using your brain to remember things. 

 When I saw the movie “Taking Care of Business” with Jim Belushi and Charles Grodin, my views on the Filofax changed.  I somehow became obsessed with owning a Filofax, even though I had no need for one.  I caved in and bought one to my delight; “I HAD A FILOFAX AND THAT’S ALL THAT MATTERED!”

 Since I was in college, I had nothing on my plate except for my classes; I spent money on this thing so I felt like I had to write something in the Filofax to validate me buying the damn thing.

 I jotted down my class times even though I already knew the schedule by heart.  I could not think of a single thing to put in it; one fateful day while in class, as the professor was droning on about God knows what, I wondered what I wanted to accomplish in my life.  Now I know that people make bucket lists all the time, but I started to do this when it wasn’t something popularly spoken. 

 One day I had one goal, the next day another and the next day another.  Soon I ended up with 4 and a half pages of things I wanted to accomplish or “Life Goals” as I called it, since I didn’t really know what a bucket list was at the time.

 My list wasn’t extreme like going skydiving, bungee jumping, swimming with sharks or climbing Mount Everest; my goals centered around my career in being an established writer, getting literary representation, sell my screenplays, finding a soulmate, getting married and buying a house just to name a few.

 It wasn’t exciting or glamorous but they were “MY” goals; they were all attainable only if I was committed to seeing it through.  As the years flew by, that Filofax of mine soon became a fixture in an obscure corner of a book shelf and then somehow ended up in storage within my closet. 

 Don’t ask me how or why that had occurred, but it did.  I guess somewhere along in my life things happened that caused me to forget about what I had wanted to accomplish.

 So cut to the present and back to the start of this post, when I stumbled across this decrepit Filofax I immediately opened it and rifled through the pages to where I scribbled my “Life Goals”.

As I looked through the list I made 20 some odd years ago, I grabbed a pen and started to check off what I had accomplished.  The ones that were accomplished put a smile on my face and satisfaction rippled down my spine. 

As for the ones that I didn’t do, I paused for a moment to wonder why that was.  Clearly it was something that I can still do.  “What’s stopping me?” is all that I could think of.  I felt that it was still a “Life Goal” that I still want to attain.

 As of this writing, I am trying my best to see things through and accomplish what I set out to do when I was a young man in college.  With a little luck, hard work and dogged determination, I know I’ll check off every single one of my “Life Goals” before I take leave of this Earth.