In-Boxes

A couple of decades ago, an in-box, to me, was simply that tray on my desk at work, or perhaps the box in which I picked up my interoffice mail. Now, technology and the general busyness of life can turn almost anything into an in-box.

There are the obvious in-boxes: regular mail and e-mail. Facebook has become its own kind of in-box, between messages I receive that way and the general keepingupness of the thing. Blogs, too, need to be regularly checked. Now that I’ve finally joined the twenty-first century and gotten myself an iPhone, there are messages there too, both phone and text. I have an answering machine on my landline; I need to watch for its flashing light.

I don’t watch TV in real time very often, so my backlog of taped shows feels like another kind of in-box; the Netflix queue adds to that feeling.

Against my better judgment, but to support Special Olympics, I’m subscribing to Rolling Stone again, which I can’t keep up with but try to read when I go to the gym. I am always issues behind. (I am someone who compulsively reads almost every word, so I generally avoid magazine subscriptions.) I have a couple of gift subscriptions as a result of Christmas. I should feel grateful, but actually, I’m panicked.

My book queue also feels like a towering in-box, with approximately thirty books sitting there waiting to be next up. Please, no one send me books for awhile. Book group, understand if I need to abandon you.

The house itself feels like its own in-box, with its never-ending tasks and, as recently noted, not enough out-boxing.