That diary, ha ! Back then I had many an entry that said ‘just a day’. I didn’t seem to have the vocabulary or skill to put down anything interesting about my day. I think I might have been worried that my little brother would read it or something.
I read two quotes today about writing and diaries.
‘We write to heighten our own awareness of life…..
We write to taste life twice.'
The Diary of Anais Nin
‘We do not write in order to be understood; we write in order to understand.’
C. Day Lewis
(how does he know when to use a semicolon?) I never do… :-)
To taste life twice. I like that. It re-enforces the idea that life is to be paid attention to. It’s not something that’s happening while we are on our way to something else.
We write to understand. I think I have spent a lot of my life thinking that I was writing to be understood. But when I read this quote, a light bulb went on over my head. I have been writing out of puzzlement, and uncertainty.
Trying to figure out the world, and my place in it. And you know, sometimes in the writing, answers come….. sometimes they come.
But ! I was talking about being attached to possessions!
Now a days I hold things so much more lightly. My things do not define me, I define my things. I suppose that is a natural progression in the human journey. This of course is not good for the gross national product.
And might even be a subversive stance to take in America. But I think the economy will plug along without my input for a while don’t you ?
Today I am happy just to have a scrap of paper and a pen to scribble with. I hope this is a trend that continues, just think of all the money I will save ! Maybe I will save enough to get a beautiful leather bound journal and write more than ….. ‘just a day’ in it’s pages.