Flashback
I ventured down into the basement over the weekend. I only searched for a moment before I saw the box labeled "Mementos" sitting on the shelf. I knew what I was looking for when I lifted the lid.
And there they were: My diaries.
All five of them, all differently shaped and decorated, spanning over 10 years of my life.
I no longer keep a diary (I guess that's what this blog has become), but somehow I wish I still did. I wrote faithfully, with just a few breaks in between, from 1992 all the way up until 2003. Sometimes, my diary was my best friend. And I believe my diaries made me the writer I am today.
Reading my words now from another time is both wildly amusing and enlightening. I see how much I've grown and how I've changed.
I see that everything was so simple, and yet everything was so important. Some entries give me a true glimpse of who I used to be--a sometimes insecure, sometimes carefree girl--and others tell me nothing, just the inane ramblings of a teenager.
On this day many years ago, I wrote:
3-1-97
Ah! The 1st Day of March! My B-Day is on the 16th, you know!
Well...the Tom [named changed to protect the innocent] problem is solved! He wrote me another letter saying he was sad at my response, but he was glad we could keep being friends. He also said it was a relief to tell me "you know what." Well, it's all patched up and over I guess; and we can pretend nothing ever happened on Monday.
Today I was proud because I woke up at 10:00 on my own! Go me! Dad got this idea to take us out somewhere. So, I took a shower and we left for Burger King. He made us sit in the car booth there (a booth "in a car") and I was soooo embarassed! After that we went to Borders... [it goes on with more inconsequential details of my day].
In case you're wondering, "Tom" was a good guy friend who confessed to me in an e-mail that he'd had feelings for me for years. The situation with him caused huge, gargantuan drama in my life at the time.
But it's not really the content of this entry that strikes me. It's my way of looking at the world like everything meant something, so much so that a trip to Burger King warranted a mention alongside my boy drama.
I guess when you're 14, everything matters. I didn't have anything too serious going on in my life, so naturally I took everything seriously. But I was never too serious; things could be bad one day and the next they'd just be breezy.
It wasn't until the following diary--and the end of 1997--that I got really, truly depressed.
But we'll save that tale for another day...
posted by Sleepy Girl @ 11:28 PM
3 Comments:
Aaah, the teenage diaries. I have mine just behind me on the top shelf of my book case. Incredibly bad poetry, spelling errors, even a drop of blood. Those were the days.
Oh I have so much bad poetry. Those were the days indeed. And isn't it wonderful that we have them captured on paper forever?
I love myself for capturing it on paper forever :)
Thanks for welcoming me to blogger. I created it in a sleepy state of mind, but I'll make good use of it. Keeping my blurty though!
By the way, I don't know if we have bubble tea here. Maybe we call it different, but I never even heard of it, can you believe it?
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