For those of us who think we have a lot on our plates, here’s some perspective: a D-Day to-do list from one of Winston Churchill’s secretaries.

As we celebrate the anniversary of D-Day I’m thinking of my visit to the Churchill War Rooms last month, when I toured the warren of secret underground chambers that were the nerve center of the British command in World War II.

I saw the room believed by almost everyone to be Churchill’s private toilet but which in fact contained a secure line to Washington. Churchill spoke to Roosevelt from this room as together they hatched plans to save the free world.

I saw the map room, where information poured in from around he world and pins marked the spots where convoys and troops were stationed. When the map room was prepared for display back in the 1980s, archivists found an envelope with three sugar cubes, the weekly ration of Wing Commander John Heagerty, tucked away in a desk drawer.

I saw the special typewriters Churchill requested for the typing pool, silent typewriters. I tried to imagine typing without the clatter. In fact, I spent a lot of time trying to imagine the rooms the way they were 84 years earlier, when Dad, who had just turned 21, prepared to climb into the tail-gunner’s seat of a B-17 bomber and fly air support for the boys on the beaches.