Why...? in Packrat

Well, it's time for navel gazing again. I've been thinking about diaries and why I keep them and what happens to them after I die? I go through this every now and then, and I still haven't satisfactorily answered myself even as I continue to keep them.

Everybody has his or her own reason for keeping a diary or journal. The online diaries make a lot of sense, taking what used to be associated with secrecy and privacy out into the public arena to be shared, and a community develops. Through online diaries I've been able to take part in a small way with the lives of people from all over the world, people I never would have known otherwise who can also share in my life. Nothing I say is just disappearing into the ether; someone can read my words and tell me right back, "I understand that." Sometimes I just want to vent; sometimes someone else can provide options I never thought of.

I've met several diarists in person, and the meeting never felt awkward because I always felt I was meeting someone I already knew.

With the demise of OD, I worried that my favorites would disappear as well, but most signed on to PB. Many don't seem to write as much as they used to, but here on PB I have new favorites whose lives have introduced me to new things, again some things I never would have thought of had it not been for the diarist talking about it.

I once said the internet was like magic because it brought me experiences and opportunities I couldn't have had otherwise.

So, I get keeping an online diary. I enjoy it.

I also enjoy keeping my paper journal, too, and I like to sometimes peruse my old ones just to see who I was and what I was up to, how I've changed. It's my life, so it's interesting to me what's happened in it, but then I think about what happens to my journals that are accumulating - the longer I live, the more there are - after I die. Despite my declarations to the contrary, I'm not going to live forever (although I think it would be a neat idea to stick around until my niece and granddaughter reach 50, the age I was when they first got here, and nobody will think I died too young if I exit at 100, after receiving my birthday greetings from the president).

I'm not a famous person so there's no reason anyone would want to read my journals, although I love reading people's diaries. Through one eyewitness account in a diary, I learned about the attitude and opinions of my ancestors, back when we were not assimilated and were a strong nation. It showed me we still are and how much we've kept of our identity, even though now we speak a foreign language and dress in the manner of the foreigners. In others, I learned about Inuits in Alaska, serving in WWII, how ordinary people coped with the Civil War, and what writers thought of their craft.

But while my journals have been a great tool for showing me patterns I follow and how much of what has happened in my life was of my own doing, I don't want my family, especially now that I have a niece, to read some of it. My journals have always been an open secret; everybody in the family knows I keep them, so I keep them openly. My grandmother used to smile and say, "Eriu will be writing that down." And for the most part at the time, I did.

They became especially precious to me when the Coyote (my cousin/brother/uncle) went into a coma, and through looking up something else I found his voice. I don't often read them over, but I did then, seeking any mention of the Coyote, and they brought him back to me and gave me great comfort. After he died, they both comforted and tormented me - knowing his presence and voice were preserved comforted me, but knowing I'd never make any more memories hurt me. However, this is one of its advantages - I get to keep something, in a way, that's gone.

But my niece and granddaughter came four years after he died, after he's already a memory. So many people mentioned in my journals are part of their history, but my record of their history comes in snippets and in how they interacted with me. I'm no historian; I'm someone keeping my daily experiences and opinions, and whatever is written in my journal is subjective.

My early journals record a kid I don't like. I want to shake her and tell her, "Lighten up! Be happy!" Sometimes someone would tell me I thought too much when what s/he really meant to say is that I overthink. I'd argue in my journal that we're not thinking enough and bring up all kinds of things to support me, unknowingly proving the person right.

But when you're young, you're experiencing some things for the first time so it's always intense, always all about you, and you're self conscious doing it. Journals taught me that, too.

I'm not worried that my niece and granddaughter will read my journals and think "What a brat!" I was. I was spoiled, snobby, and pretentious. I don't have the need that they think I was perfect; being imperfect is a binding force.

Let's just say, I wasn't always a good girl. While I may enjoy remembering some things, I don't want my family having to read about...intimate issues, particularly with...er...ahhh...(cough)...well, someone I should have been adult enough to walk away from, although I learned a lot about some of my own issues through wondering why I willingly entered a "relationship" that I knew I shouldn't, especially since it has been the longest "relationship" I've had (and why?). (It's been over for years, and while I lived and learned from it and don't regret it, it's also something I don't want to share with my NIECE and GRANDDAUGHTER.)

If I threw them away, when is the time to do so? If I instruct that they be destroyed, how can I know that they will be? I don't want my family to have to read some things, but there are other things I hate to think will be lost - not just memories of people but of landmark events I've been lucky enough to be a part of.

But the landmarks come in with the daily drivel; my journals would be a good sleep aid to anyone else but me.

So I still don't know what to do. The historian in me thinks they should be kept, but the private person I am thinks they should be heavily edited if I do that.

Then again, could be that I never got over that overthinking thing.