I just did something glorious. 

It might be the best thing I’ve ever done. 

Are you ready? 

Here it goes: 

I bought a five-year planner. 

Please read that in a Cuba Gooding Jr., “Show me the money!” kind of voice. 

You know the kind of planner I’m talking about, right?  

The spiral-bound, 8.5-by-11-inch-monthly kind of planner. The kind with each month spread across two wonderful pages. The kind with the previous and upcoming months in the margin. The kind with a little notes section in that same margin. 

Yes. I know it’s not 1983. I know I could — probably should — do all my planning digitally. 

But my brain doesn’t work that way. I need it all laid out before me. I mean, the dry erase board says it all. 

You — you don’t know about the dry erase board? 

It’s the two-month calendar in my kitchen. Everyone’s schedule — mine, my husband’s, the kids’, even our dog’s — is on that calendar. 

Of course it’s color-coded by family member! Unless we’ve descended into anarchy. 

Have we? Have we descended into anarchy?  

No?  

Then the two-month dry erase calendar in the kitchen is color coded by family member. 

“Um, this is the work of a serial killer,” my friend said one day, regarding my dry erase calendar with what I’d like to call awe and respect. “This isn’t healthy.” 

I mean, yes. He’s a psychiatrist.  

But isn’t being a serial killer on the far end of the fastidious spectrum?  

And no. I don’t think my refusal to allow anyone else to write on the dry erase board is a ridiculous rule. 

Unless you enjoy looking at the color-coded dry erase board and seeing four different kinds of handwriting.  

That’s like looking in the fridge and seeing the bread on the wrong side of the shelf. 

Now that would be anarchy. 

Wait. You didn’t just ask me why I need a five-year planner if I have the two-month dry erase board, did you? 

Of course you didn’t. That’s just silly. 

You recognize that I, like you, have much of my life over the next five years planned.  

If we weren’t meant to plan five years in advance, the kids’ schools wouldn’t release the next school year’s calendar in March. 

Tell me that’s not one of the best days of the year.  

When I get the email saying the next school year’s calendar is posted — that’s some fine me time right there. A cup of tea, a few cookies, and most of the next year and a half nicely planned out.  

I brought that five-year planner to my favorite New Jersey coffee joint. Over a chocolate chip scone and steaming mug of tea, I filled my calendar. 

And it’s a good thing I did, too.  

I have to get my oldest back to college from summer break in, like, four months.  

I recognize she’s not even home yet. But those hotels and flights really should have been booked two months ago. 

When did I become such a slacker? 

And my youngest. He graduates from high school in 14 months. Fourteen! That means he applies to colleges in six months. Scholarships in nine months. Senior internships in seven months.  

I mean, we’re just so far behind. 

And we’re thinking about going to Ireland in the summer of 2026. A trip like that — it demands a lot of research. 

Well, a trip to the grocery store demands a lot of research. Ireland just requires, you know, more. 

Thanks to my five-year planner, I recognized I needed to get Rick Steves’ Ireland from the library now. 

Well, January would have been better.  

But it was March when I filled that planner. So it was March when I read through Rick Steves’ Ireland. 

It’s a good thing I did, too. How else could I have sent my family a seventeen-point Google Forms questionnaire requesting their input on our Irish destinations? 

Hmm. I probably should have given them a deadline for that questionnaire.  

It’s been, like, three weeks since I sent it. Nobody has answered. 

Oh! Maybe they need their own five-year planners!  

Yes. Their own five-year planners. 

Color coded, of course.