Big news this week. Britney Spears' personal and private diaries have been stolen. Stolen and probably sold for a whole lot of money. Can you imagine your personal diary being sold? I'm thinking of the content of my journal. Mine is a standard size journal that can be purchased in any bookstore - 8 1/2" x 11" hardcover, about 200 lined pages. The first entry is June 1986, I am age 24, it is near our first anniversary. The last entry is July 2004. This book covers 18 years of my life. It still has about 110 blank pages. Yes, that is correct. Eighteen years of my life is recorded in less than 1/2 of a journal. What disappoints me more than the absence of volume, is the absence of excitement. I think my kids may someday read bits and pieces of it, places that I have written about them. But I don't think I could pay anyone to sit down and read the whole thing. I'm thinking I need to ramp up the excitement level of my life. I need to add something to my life to make my journal worthy of theft.
Some random entries begin with --
1988 Dave took Rachel with him this morning to run some errands. The house seems too quiet with just Brady and I here . . . .
1988 We had some frustrating car problems - last night, the heater core developed a bad leak and BIG mists of antifreeze were spraying inside the car from the vents and covered the windows with a greasy film. . . .
1988 Dave rolled Rachel up in a big blanket and called her a burrito. The next day she got out all the towels from the cupboard and rolled up her babies and animals and made baby burritos. I found bundles around the house for days . . . .
1989 Dave took time off work this week to rebuild the roof. All day Monday, he tore the roof down to the wood. Wouldn't you know - for the first time in 6 months, it rained. We woke up to water dripping onto our bed . . . .
1992 Dave and I still share one junky old car. I look forward to the day when we have 2 cars. Sometimes I feel frustrated (sometimes angry) being at the mercy of his schedule to do anything on my own . . . .
1995 I think this is going to be a good year for Roxanne. Her 3rd year was a rough one - a lot of defiance, a lot of "NO"s, (and she means it when she says it). It seemed strange to see that happening because her so-called terrible twos were marvelous! She was a delightful 2 year old . . . .
The problem is that my life is pretty predictable, fairly average, kind of non-exciting. My high school and college journals weren't any better. I was painfully shy and hated getting noticed and hated getting in trouble so basically, I did nothing worthy of a great journal entry. " . . . I'm working on my english essay this week . . . " The most covert operation I ever conceived, carried out and journaled is in my 6th grade diary. We didn't have a TV in our house that year and I befriended a neighborhood girl just so I could watch after-school TV at her house each day.
But in my non-exciting life, I love that I've got a hard-working husband that is willing to fix the roof and many other things over the years, a fun creative daughter that has fond memories of her preschool years, a daughter that has turned into a lovely even-tempered 17 year old despite her rough third year. Four kids that were oblivious to the fact that we were living near poverty for many years - broken cars, an old house, and thanks to many cousins, lots of hand-me-down clothes.
I kind of love my regular, predictable, non-exciting life.
And now I've wet your appetite with the sample entries, my journal is up for sale. Bids begin at $29.99. (Don't even think of stealing it. )
6 comments:
Are there pictures?
Dear Ms. Calizona - Every picture in our photo albums of the first decade of our marriage display old cars and hand me down clothes. Interested in bidding on that too?
It's uncanny how we all have so much in common! My journals also cover spans of "decades" of non excitement!
Isn't that how journals are supposed to be? I faithfully wrote nonsense in Jr High about who liked who and what I wore to school. I have one entry just before I turned 16 about the boy that I wanted to ask me out on my 16th birthday and then I wrote once in college when it snowed three feet in 6 hours and school was canceled. That's about it. Some pretty significant things happened in all those years and I have nothing written about it.
Thank goodness for blogging, huh? Finally my posterity will have something to read that I'm only occasionally embarrassed about. Plus, I never take the time to write well in my journal. It's more like a boring list of what I've done. And blogs are written knowing some one will read it...immediately. I'm inspired by an audience I guess.
I have to admit, I have always been a journal writer. Some years were more interesting than others but I have been fairly consistant since high school up until the past 10 years and then it's been quite sporadic. However, I too have found blogging to be the thing to keep me motivated.
I sort of think of having "two sets of plates"...the historic (blog) and the spiritual (which doesn't show up on the world wide web). I seem to be doing much better with journaling once again.
Hey - used cars and handmedown duds are the backbone of America.
Let's redefine "exciting"; if being a top of the charts pop star preggers twice in quick succession bald once rehabed multiples selling overt sexu-slutality to tweeners is exciting - then 90% of the population (fortunately)is dismally mundane.
Why not re-write your life story? Give that clunker car a personality like Chitty-chitty-bang-bang, or describe routine family doings w/colorful, heroic overtones... that's closer to the truth, isn't it?
Just the dialogue your family generates at times is engaging enough; who wouldn't want a Mel piping-up? Or a Brady punch-line? Rachel giggling? Rox philosophy? Or a SuperDave brandishing tools that rescue the family from high jinx disasters???
Besides, we all know if you illustrated it yourself, it would be darling, and the average American Mom would feel validated through what our culture is rapidly forgetting: the virtues and super-stardom of the morally- conscious devoted wife and mother.
Make no apologies please for doing just that. Brittney should be so fortunate to finally get it right some day.
Name the tractor "Bob", and I'll start the bidding @ $20.
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