Chronically Chronicling

I started keeping a paper journal about age 8 or 9. I wrote pretty consistently from ages 13 to about 17 or so then sporadically, with some long periods of consistently, from 17 until now. I will probably continue to do so. I honestly have no idea if anyone other than me will ever read them. But they are for me not for anyone else.

I write less on paper when I am posting content on my web log, which I have had since 2004. So I have been journaling on line for over 11 years now.

Caroline has been reading my web log. She is up to 2009 and says she has learned a lot about her childhood that she didn’t know or remember.

When writing the online journal, I always kept in the back of my mind that Caroline might be reading this down the road.

Also being married to a writer of stuff with a bit of a following probably kept me from making those mistakes of over sharing. There are entries that I wanted to write or did write and then didn’t post because, after reflection, we really didn’t need the possible fallout from me saying something that would be taken out of context and used against Peter.

I blame and thank Louise Fizthugh author of Harriet the Spy for my love of journaling. She made it sound like a neat idea and so I started doing so.

I still have those journals. I have all my paper journals in various places. I do occasionally go back and reread previous parts of my life.

There are times that I wonder what the point of it is but then I remember that the paper is for me and the electronic is for others.

So I will continue to write here and other places. Even if, right now, no one is reading because there is always the chance that down the road that someone will and it will either help them or explain something to them about me that they hadn’t realized.

It is my record of my life and the people in it. It is my legacy to the future in a strange way.

Plus if I ever had to write an autobiography, I have my material.

I am grateful that I have written about my life.