Maybe I didn’t set my sights high enough, because I got everything done that I wanted to accomplish today, and I still wasn’t satisfied. I probably should have aimed a little higher, I guess, or set my satisfaction level a little lower. But I thought I was doing all right, for a Sunday. There were four important items I wanted to cross off my to-do list today, and I got through them all. That should have been enough to make me happy.

It wasn’t that I wanted to do more than I did. Oh, no. Not that. It was something else that was gnawing away at my serenity. Something was slapping my composure about the face. Something kept tying my mental shoelaces together and laughing as I tripped over my thoughts. I could go on like this, but I won’t.

Later this evening I think I figured out the reason. I wasn’t trying to do too many things, but I was trying to do too many things at once. I couldn’t enjoy the satisfaction of getting from A to Z in any of them. I do that during the week, out of necessity because I keep getting interrupted. But if I’m working on a weekend, why shouldn’t I take my little pleasures where I can get them? My job can be almost fun if I do one thing at a time (and do it well).

The reason I could solve the riddle after I gave up working was that I was still doing it! I was paying bills and cooking and straightening up the clutter and checking the transaction wire (it’s one of those winter baseball deadlines today) and doing anything and everything that occurred to me, until it occurred to me that I was doing too many things not very well without enjoying it much.

So here’s the new plan, and it’s just for weekends. One thing at a time. If I’m doing something, I try not to do something else until I’m finished with the first something. On weekdays, multitasking is a matter of necessity, because I never know what I’m going to get hit with. Even today, the fax machine was whirring, as if the Boss didn’t know it was Sunday (or was pretending he didn’t know, anyway). I can’t give in to that. I’m going to try to enjoy my weekends, even my working weekends, and I’m not even going to wait until next January 1 to make this resolution. Just next weekend.