This Unique Day

We do not remember days, we remember moments.

Cesare, Parese, Time Alive

I wanted to use my beautiful Calendar Companion weekly planner in a way that would help me capture the essence of each day. I already have a Book of Days in which I record phenological markers, like when the locust trees begin to leaf out, or the first dandelion gone to seed. So I came up with the idea of using the weekly planner to record a unique event on every day: something that had never happened before and I didn’t think would ever happen again.

This rather casual decision had an unexpectedly delightful effect, by shifting my attitude away from expected pleasures. While in my Book of Days, I’m recording natural phenomena, in my Unique Event log, I’m more often noting human actions. For instance: April 5: A guy walks into Online Coffee and shouts “Have a blessed day. Jesus has risen.” OR March 14: The violin man outside the QFC was playing the guitar tonight. Other times, however, they are natural events like March 25: The leaves on the tree across the street are the exact same color as the bricks of the apartment building. Perhaps my favorite so far: April 7: Pepe (the Chihuahua) licks a pink cherry blossom that has been dropped in the parkway.

Of course, there are mnay unique moments in a day. That is more and more obvious to me (a creature of habit who loves routine). And I am especially intrigued by noticing what I find significant enough to record. I’d love to hear about the unique events in your days.