New journal
I’ve kept a journal since I was a kid. The first one I ever had was a tiny, padded book with My Diary splayed across the cover. It was blue and white and had a magical unicorn on the front and a tiny lock on the side.
I still have that unicorn diary buried in a box, along with every journal afterward (minus a few precious ones thrown out by a disgruntled friend). I’ve lugged these journals across Canada, from Toronto to Vancouver. Boxes of feelings are tucked away in the far end of my closet.
I rarely read over them unless I’m moving and naturally get sucked into the void of past nostalgia and chuckle at the absurdities of my twenty-year-old self. Obsessions were quite intense back then!
My latest journal is bigger than I usually get, but the color roped me in. It’s such a juicy color it reminds me of Starburst candies. It’s a cloth-covered Moleskine. I love the feeling of their thin pages, although next time I might go back to a blank notebook (I'm always doodling) instead of a lined one.
Having a renewed interest in blogging, I often think about the line between journaling for yourself and sharing things on the web for public consumption. How personal is too personal? Which makes me ponder, why do I blog? To share? To connect? To seek out kinship with others who share a similar taste? To build an online record of personal stories? To feel less alone? I'm constantly evaluating this.