I always struggle with writing. It’s my saving grace, and at the same time it nearly kills me. I write to escape from the troubles of my life; or I write to take the emotions out my body and put them onto paper. I usually burn the angry pages.
“The nicest part is being able to write down all my thoughts and feelings, otherwise I'd absolutely suffocate.” (The Diary of Anne Frank, March, 1944)
I have kept a journal since the age of six. That’s right; at six years old I was writing my thoughts and pouring my heart out onto the pages. Or not. I doodled flowers and hearts and practiced writing my name. But I still had my very own diary with a drawing of a bunny. It was something my Mom gave to me; she explained to me that it was important to have something for myself that no one else could see. It was my own private world kept together between the pages.
Through the years, I have written in a variety of journals. I have kept journals for dreams, school, friendships, poems, short stories – you get the picture. When I made it to high school the journals I kept got dark – at least it felt that way to me. I ran myself into an emotional ditch and stayed there for four years. I wrote about death: wondering what it would be like to not be on this earth anymore; I wrote about losing my cousin Matt when I was seventeen and how I couldn’t imagine life without him. I poured out my soul: how sad I felt and how helpless my life seemed to be at ages fourteen through seventeen. I also kept my work to myself; I couldn’t let others in, afraid that if I made a vulnerable move, I would be hurt.
That’s when Mom got involved. She never actually read my journal, but she knew from my actions that it wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows. I wasn’t doing in well in school – I couldn’t have cared less about school when I was fifteen. I was angry with myself for not trying harder, but I took it out on everyone else or just wrote vigorously. So Mom asked me to start writing “happy stories” in an effort to make me happy. It almost worked.
What helped me to write “happy stories” was college. I got here with my “Fab Four” of friends and I had something happy to write about. I was happy, therefore my writing picked up an interesting perspective. I wrote about love, life, overcoming challenges; my Mom actually wanted to read my work, only I wasn’t willing to share. It was still very personal, no matter how happy it seemed to be.
September, 2007 I started dating my first boyfriend (yes, I got a late start on the relationship side of life). My writing changed so much with dating Kevin. Basically, my writing got a little cheesy. I wrote about the most wonderful love and how hard it is to find. I wrote clichés: he was the “one;” the “love of my life;” he was “in my heart forever.” But I was happy. My journal was filled with love poems, which I had never before been able to successfully write.
The interesting thing about keeping a journal, or a diary, is that no one else has to see it. You can write whatever you want – you can rant and rave about someone you don’t get along with, write about the person you like, create stories, describe your dreams – and no one else in the entire universe will ever know unless you decide to open up that part of you and share it with someone.
The only person I ever showed my personal writing to was Kevin. He always saw me scribbling in my currently purple journal and was so curious about what I was putting on paper. One day he flat out asked me, “So, what have you written about me?” I was nervous to share my love poems, or my entries of how hard I had fallen for him. But one day, when he didn’t ask, I brought my book over and read to him a few parts I felt he’d like to know. I read about the day we met, the day we started dating, memories of our first date, etc. When I started to read some of my poems, Kevin interrupted me and told me I should be published. I just stared at him. “Are you crazy?! This is my journal – I don’t want this all over the world!” He laughed and exclaimed how “wonderful” my work was. But I don’t think I’d ever have the courage to publish my poems.
I do, however, admire those who have had their diaries published, whether it was during their lifetime or afterward. The first diary I read was that of Anne Frank, the famous Jewish girl who hid with her family and neighbors during World War II. I was in the fourth grade and was mesmerized by how she captured the imagery of her neighborhood, her school, and her friends and family in hiding. It rocked my world as a nine-year-old. I wept. Never had I known anything to be so disheartening in my short life. But it only encouraged me to write more and to be more descriptive, so that if something were to happen to me, my family would have my written words.
"I know I can write. A few of my stories are good, my descriptions of the Secret Annex are humorous, much of my diary is vivid and alive, but... it remains to be seen whether I really have talent.” (The Diary of Anne Frank, April, 1944) I couldn’t agree more: I have yet to show myself that I have talent as a writer. Anne was just thirteen years old when she wrote in her diary. She had the courage to share some of the short stories she wrote with her family and neighbors in the Secret Annex.
One person who doesn’t understand my writing is my father. He thinks I waste time with “that nonsense.” It’s not a life skill that will give me a steady income, therefore I shouldn’t bother. But writing is so much more to me than making a living. It’s what keeps me alive so that I can function in life. Without my journals, I would be lost. I would have exploded with so many emotions years ago, had I not gotten them out of my system and onto paper.
So I keep writing; everyday, or as close to everyday as possible. It keeps me sane and functioning like a normal human being. I will never quit. It’s my crutch that gets me through.
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