Dear Diary

Dear Diary

Did you ever have a diary as a child? I did, and what I remember most about it was that it came with a tiny lock and key. What a wonderful way to write down all your secrets as a ten year old knowing they were kept safely locked away in your diary. 

In my late teen years I started keeping a journal. I went through a poetry stage where I wrote free verse about the angst of adolescence. I doubt it was actually anything I might want to share at an open mike night, but I fancied myself to have some talent. 

It was during my twenties that I regularly kept a journal. My twenties were a tough decade for me. My mother had passed away unexpectedly from cancer, my father remarried, and while my friends were getting married, and having children, I was still single. 

A journal was a way to express my feelings, and help me make some sense out of them. Sometimes, though, it was just a way to indulge in my sadness. 

I find it interesting that decades later I’m writing a blog, which actually is a digital journal of sorts. 

Sometimes when something is on my mind, and I can’t seem to stop ruminating on it, I find writing it down is the best way to move on. What is kind of sad, though, is that there are times I go back and read a journal entry from years ago, and I still find I’m dealing with the same issue. 

Why can we be so complicated at times? Or is just those unlucky few cursed with the “gift” of analysis?

If you’ve never been one to keep a journal or a diary, it can be a way of recording your life for posterity’s sense. Kinda of like a written scrapbook of what’s happening in your life at a certain time. 

Do you keep a journal, and has it helped you in anyway?

“Paper is more patient than people.”

Anne Frank