Dear Diary

As I routinely laid my day’s jewelry in my small antique bowl, my eyes moved upward noticing the row of books I had placed on the shelf a few years back. Books that range from biographies to Paris travel guides to Robert Frost poetry. Also in that collection are my old journals. Journals that I haven’t written in or read in years.

As a child I was obsessed with blank books. Unfilled journals. I was constantly buying them. I had this idea that one day I would fill them all with words. My words. Words that I would creatively orchestrate into a poem or a personal essay. To me, my written word was proof that I was here. That I existed.

I guess I’m still that way.

All throughout my childhood I often felt invisible. Skipped over. Not worth the effort. Looking back now, that contradicts how my life really was. My parents showed me unbelievable love. I was popular with my friends. I won awards and was fed compliments. But yet I somehow still felt undeserving.

I removed my journals from the shelf, sat on the couch and began thumbing through the pages. Reading my own words written by the younger me. Remembering how I felt as I wrote each entry. Sadness. Anger. Confusion. Not unlike the feelings that motivate the writings of this older me. It’s just more alarming when it comes from the mind of a 13 year old. Somehow when you’re older, being bitter is expected.

I notice some of the entries are quite powerful. After finishing a page, there are no questions left to ask. Feelings are clearly explained. I've discovered that my words were more raw and forthcoming as a child than they are as an adult.

There are also pages full of love and hope. Ideas for my future. Wants, needs, desires. Most of which make me smile since they are totally unrealistic. I wrote confessions of love for some stupid boy and then admitting hurt when the feelings weren’t reciprocated.

I have my grandmother’s diary from the early 1930’s. She mostly wrote about school and washing her hair. She mentioned a few times about being ill and staying in bed. After she died, I selfishly and sentimentally gathered several of her old things – her diary being one of them.

I’ve read through it many times and enjoy her innocence. I love knowing her at that age through her words. However after reading my own childhood journals… I wonder who will possess them after I’m gone. Who will be the one to thumb through my personal thoughts? My words reveal much more than my grandmother ever would have dreamed.

If as a child I viewed my journals as proof that I existed, then I must let them be exactly that. No need to hide how I felt. What I was. What I am.

I suspect this blog is a mere continuation of me proving that I exist.