A Time for Writing

"To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven." Ecclestiastes 3:1 KJV

When I was in 2nd grade my parents bought me my first diary. I think I had just read too many books and watched too many tv shows of the Sweet Valley High and Babysitter's Club nature. Whatever the inspiration though, at 7 years old I felt I needed to have a Diary, with lock and key, to write down my inner most personal thoughts and feelings. Since then I have accumulated maybe 10 journals that from time to time I flip through and remember when...

I have come to think of them as an ongoing manuscript, a first rough draft of my memoirs -- but in the most vivid detail, and written from the perspective of the very moment it speaks of. The words are not biased by a selected memory, but rather raw in their innocence, naivete, joy, stupidity, ambitiousness, anger, sadness, intelligence, hopefulness and most of all love.

Always able to express myself most articulately through the written word, there was a time when writing was simultaneously my haven and my heaven. Somehow though, the necessity for it was lost and I'm disappointed to say that my current journal spans about 2 years if not more, with sparing entries entered only on those nights when there was not a soul in the world to talk to and my mind would not be at ease until I poured thoughts out of me in some fashion.

It is true that this relationship I have with journaling is rather volatile, but I always come back to it. Like a boomerang, I just can not help it. A better metaphor would be that of a best friend who though our relationship changes over time - at times growing closer, then further a part - we never lose touch, never will be able to fall out of love.

And so, I have reached a point where this is so necessary for me again. Where I need this to be my confidant. But I am trying it differently - publicly: the furthest thing from the lock diary which I took extra care to hide the key for so many years ago. A gesture of openness, perhaps?

I am realizing that things and people around me are changing, growing. If I want to hold on and be a part, I have to mature with them. But at the very core, some things will always remain near and dear, regardless of how its importance waxes and wanes.