I'm a little worried about myself. I've been acting out of character lately in the things that I've chosen to do.

One morning I got up with a driving desire to clean the stove, not only the surface units, but also the oven. I began with the area around the control knobs where spatters and grease film accumulate, and worked my way down, doing a thorough job. Not once did I toy with giving in to shortcuts or putting off part of the project for another day. So strange.

Recently, I took the time to soak the plastic iced tea jug in bleach. The yellow jug was stained dark brown, as will happen if it is filled regularly with tea. A reasonable question is, why bother? It will be stained again in no time and the taste of the tea is not affected. For appearance sake, I pour the tea in a glass pitcher if guests are present and they never see the plastic container anyway.

I remember a best friends's birthday in plenty of time to send her a nice card in the mail. Usually, I'm beset with the circumstance of buying a belated card and writing an apologetic note inside. I can't figure out what caused me to think of it early this year.

This particular mode that sucked me in motivated me to defrost and clean out the chest freezer. Among housekeeping chores, defrosting the freezer probably is put off longer than any others. It was long overdue at my house, but for a mysterious moment, I did not look at the chore with dread, but with anticipation.

My back still got tired; my hands ached up to my elbows; and I skinned my knuckles on the hard ice that didn't want to turn loose. Yet, I worked through to the end, feeling satisfaction as I went.

Perhaps the hardest to explain is my pulling out boxes of photographs, stacks of old pictures mounted on brittle cardboard, school pictures of snaggletoothed first-graders, and snapshots plentifully made of family, friends, and unidentifiable people and places. My intention was to decide on a system of organization and to attack this ever-growing mountain of a project.

I thought about the possibilities: albums, file boxes, computer storage; separating them by kinship; filing chronologically; selecting creatively and putting together subject themes. Ideas came to me that were exciting.

I shuffled the pictures until they were more mixed up than before. For some reason, my enthusiasm began to wane. I put them back in their original boxes and shoved them in the closet until another day. So far, that "another day" hasn't dawned. Could this be a sign that I am returning to my old self? Maybe I'll be okay.