Email. It’s the leash that ties me to…everything and everyone. I have two main accounts. One is for work and one is personal. I keep them separate. Having unread emails is a source of anxiety to me. Seeing that little red bubble on my phone sends me into a panic. I just cannot deal. I move my work email to the last page of my phone and turn off notifications for the weekend. Seeing those emails come in would just ruin me.

So I have a system…as any good ADHDer does. I’m an out of sight—out of mind kind of gal. So if I don’t see a task on a list, post-it, or email inbox, it ceases to exist.

Object permanence, man. It’s not just for infants. 

So anything needing to be addressed stays in my inbox until I have done whatever is necessary. That request for a new piece of equipment at work? Doesn’t move until I’ve checked it out, documented, and dropped it off. That email from the teacher about permission slips…stays in the inbox until the slip has been delivered. Only then can it be filed away into a maze of sub folders to refer to when I inevitably forget the date or that he was supposed to bring 3 quarters and a beach towel.

Did I mention that I am also a digital hoarder?

I’m terrified to actually send anything to the trash. I’m equally terrified to leave it in my inbox. So subfolders have become my organization tool of choice.

The other day my main digital documentation tool was unavailable to me. I was starting to get nervous by all the emails stacking up that needed to be sent to OneNote. I decided I would categorize anything in my inbox purple if I needed to document it later. I color-coded to do items and follow-ups as well. I was left with an organized inbox filled with maybe 50 items just before I had to leave for office hours in another building.

My computer needed a restart to complete some updates so I set it to do its thing as I packed up. When I was complete, I relaunched Outlook only to see all my emails disappearing one-by-one.

In a panic I sent in a ticket to IT while I mentally had a breakdown. It turns out that everything…and I mean EVERYTHING…had somehow been moved to my archived folder. How? No one can say. But as someone who gets sometimes 100+ emails a day, how was I supposed to weed through all those messages to reconstruct my digital to-do list?! I wanted to cry.

When I clicked on the archive folder, I saw it. My color coding had carried over and I was able to fairly easily identify all 50 or so messages. I did have to go back through about 12 weeks of messages to find them all…but I’m fairly certain I was able to recover at least the most important ones.

That sent me on a mission today to get my list…and, hence, my inbox…down to zero. I’ve only ever done it one other time this year right before winter break. But as luck would have it, the last couple of approvals I was waiting for came through and I was able to address every email I had left.

It lasted literally 48 seconds. But it was a beautiful almost minute. 

I was freaked out that maybe my calendar had also archived. Luckily it hadn’t. Although looking at my March, I might have been nice to say…I’m sorry…I don’t have that on my calendar.

I am writing for the 18th annual Slice of Life challenge presented by Two Writing Teachers.