Why I write lists

I write a lot of lists. Lists of foreign countries I have been to, long books I’ve read, bands I’ve seen, and famous people I’ve met. They make me look like an asshole.

But I don’t write these lists to be an asshole. It definitely appears to be that way to the uneducated eye, but if you knew me, if you understood how my brain works and how it thinks, you would understand the lists.

Let’s take the concert lists for an example, as I recently updated one. Keeping track of every concert I attend and then laying them all out in numerous fashions is not me bragging to the world of my achievements. I don’t mean to say “Look how many indie bands I have seen!” The pages of concert listings are for me and me only, and if I happen to bring it up in conversation, it is to reassure myself that they are important in some way, or helpful. After I’ve written that first list, I can’t help but continue the list, number it out, add to it, rearrange it. I keep changing it.

More lists have appeared from the first two official lists (“concerts I’ve been to” and “total bands seen live”). Now I list all the bands I’ve seen individually, so I now have an exact figure of bands I have seen (147). I also broke down the number of concerts I have seen by year, then by each month within the year. It’s obsessive and sick in a way. And I know this. But if I didn’t do this, I wouldn’t know that the two months in which I have seen the most concerts so far have been April of 2008 and June of 2009. I also wouldn’t know that from 2005 to 2006, my yearly concert attendance jumped from 8 to 15. And that in 2008 it went up to 18. I wouldn’t know that I attended the exact same number of concerts in 2007 that I did in 2006. Also, the time when I saw the most concerts in a row (8) was April and May of 2008, which was, coincidentally, just before my French Baccalaureate exams.

But what’s the use for all of this? Who cares? Do I care? I don’t even know. The more lists I make about this, the more I fascinate myself. After they’re written, all I do with them is add on and occasionally open them to scroll through 13 or 14 times in one sitting. Scrolling through the lists is a wonderful feeling for me. But what the hell? Is that all they do?

This brings me to my point.

I have a habit of counting things down. Even if I am enjoying myself immensely, I count down to the minute at which something will end. I check the time and estimate how much longer I have in a moment or event. I check the calendar for how many more days in a trip, in a month. I keep a countdown on my Google home page to whatever big event I can latch onto. I am always asking the duration of something, which makes me sound rude. I am not trying to be rude. I just need to know so my brain can start the countdown. No matter what I do, I am counting down. When I was depressed, I used to countdown the hours till 11pm (when I would go to sleep) so I would know how much longer till I had gotten through another day.

And the thing is, I have always hated math. But I do not hate numbers. The only time I hate numbers is when I am using them against me; like I do with, yes, counting down. I wish I could stop counting down completely. I wish I cold enjoy time without wondering when something is going to end. Why do I wonder at all when I am having so much fun? It’s not that I am wishing for it to end. I’m just wondering when it will end. And this distracts me and pulls me out of the moment and I can’t reenter it for a while.

Then people think I’m getting upset. I am not. I am trying to stop counting.

These lists I make, whether they be for concerts I’ve attended, museums I’ve been to, airlines I’ve traveled on, or movies I have hated…they are my way of trying to satiate my craving for numbers. If I make enough lists, and reread them often enough, I don’t count time down. But when I stop the lists, the counting down begins.

Just a month ago I was on a trip with two close friends. I found myself counting the hours down till we had to go back to school. It was one of the most enjoyable weekends of my life and they were two of my favorite people on earth and we were in one of my favorite cities in the world and all I could do was count hours. One night, in my friend’s attic bedroom we were staying in, I tried writing a list of the things we had done that weekend so far, but it did not satisfy my brain.

To this day I remember that weekend with extreme fondness and I had an amazing time. I definitely had fun, don’t doubt that. But I was counting.

And that’s why I need the lists.
I really need them.
I don’t care if you know I’ve been to 12 different countries or not. Yeah, I would love to talk about my time there, but the number isn’t what matters. Remember this: if I say it, I am trying to validate myself with numbers.

It has gotten to the point that next term at school, I will be hanging a list on my wall by my bed. Any list, I just need one to look at. Then I will be going to the school pysch. I have fucking had it with missing the moment because of a clock.