Journal-ist...?

Lightmancer

Legend
Location
Sunny Frimley
Name
Bill Palmer
On Friday I met an ex-colleague of mine. In the course of our discussion he mentioned going with me to visit a particular client, years ago. I denied it, but he insisted, fired up his laptop and told me that, on a particular day in 2007 we had indeed driven - in my car - to a meeting with that client. I joked that he knew my history better than I did, but it set me to thinking. Since the advent of Outlook and not carrying a Filofax my memory of events has been confined to notes from business meetings in a small Moleskine or Leuchturm, sporadic entries in a travel journal when on holiday and the visual memory-joggers of the photos I have taken as I have travelled the world.

What I do not have is a straightforward diary of the hard-copy, longhand, couple of lines a day variety. So today I have decided to change that. Even if it is only a word or two I intend to not let all my thoughts and feelings, all my memories, be ephemeral any more. This is not about poncy posterity, by the way, but it is a recognition that "living in the now" isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Anyone else feel the same?
 
I do! But I'm too undisciplined to keep any form of journal or diary. My wife on the other hand has an Excel spreadsheet pretty much detailing every single day that we spent with each other since she and I met in 2006. It's impressive!!!
 
After my father in law died last year, we found countless journals that he'd kept faithfully over many, many years. They now provide a fascinating insight for my daughters. Nothing monumental but just the minutiae of his daily life.
 
I tried purchasing an agenda a couple of times. Longest I've ever used it was probably about 6 or 7 weeks. I'm sure a diary would have no different fate. Would like to be more disciplined about it though, I love rummaging through old stuff. I've been a nostalgic since I was about 10 years old :tongue:
 
I know what you're saying, Bill. I keep deciding to do that very thing, mainly because my memory seems to be much faultier than I thought it was. The problem is in deciding how to do it. I've tried doing it electronically and it just doesn't work for me. Perhaps longhand is the go. But one needs the discipline to do it.
 
This is part of what drives me with photography of events and places and people... it unfortunately took me several years to realize but my memory for those types of details isn't very good, and I've lost many great memories simply because I have no reminders of them. I could kick myself now for all the trips I went on without even bringing a camera. Just this morning I realized I have no photos at all of a great road trip my best friend and I made 10 years ago.

Keeping a journal is a great idea, but like others have posted I have no discipline for maintaining one for the long term. I've tried several times and own lots of little moleskin notebooks and the like, it just never seems to stick, sadly.
 
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