The Right Write

A couple weeks into the pandemic lockdown I started a journal.  I had kept hand written journals in the past, most notably during the 2004/2005 hurricane seasons when I lived in Florida.  There is something that feels much more solid, more real, more permanent, and more personal in a hand written journal compared to a blog.

The journal has evolved over time, at first including writing from our writing group Words of Our Own at my church (a zoom group writing to prompts) and later including letters to my daughter, Ellen.

The entries have gotten further and further apart.  In part, it's because the days are all starting to seem pretty much the same. In part, it's because it's physically easier for me to type than to hold a pen.  

And I worry what thoughts are being lost because I'm not engaging more fully with pen and ink.

I do not think I would have blogged so publicly about the pain I felt on Mother's Day as I did on my hand written journal, nor railed at my son for some of his passive aggressive bouts, born, no doubt, out of the fear and frustration in his life at the time.  I don't know if I would go so freely into my feelings, at least the negative ones, in a public forum, as opposed to writing things I'm pretty sure no one would read until after my death, if even then.

There is a freedom in ink that you don't get with a keyboard.  I've written that one "bleeds ink onto the paper" in past poetry.  And I feel that's true to a great deal. Some people won't read books electronically because they need the feel of the book in their hands, the physical turning of pages.  I guess what I experience is the author's version of that: where I need to feel the pen gliding over the pages.  I often draw in my diary as well, quick, messy little pen sketches that reflect something right in front of me, or something that catches my eye or imagination, or some craft item I want to create.  I can't do that easily digitally.

So things are lost.

But at the same time, things are found, because I can write longer.  I don't end quickly, chopping off a thought because of a hand cramp.  I don't worry about the flow of the pen, and whether writing with a pen with less (literal) resistance at the tip would allow me to write longer.  

I can explore ideas more fully using a keyboard, and while I may shy away from detailing my frustration with one of my children, I will be more likely to explore the underlying experiences or current social pressures that contribute to that frustration.  And I am much less likely to simply vent blame. 

Digital journaling brings me out of the realm of a purely personal, almost hedonistic experience to a more universal, social experience.  While I'm not sharing the dismal details of my bank account here as I do in my written journal, I will share that it is, indeed, dismal. The dollars and cents amount may be interesting to some future generation who has little idea of what personal finances are today (for example, back when my mother sent me to the store with $2 to buy a 5 loaf pack of bread and three pounds of "the cheap stuff  [hamburger]", I would have never imagined todays prices!) well, for those future readers, perhaps they would be amazed or amused that bread cost about $4 per loaf, and that hamburger (the cheap stuff) was a mere $5.99/lb at Trader Joe's.

After contemplating this, I've pretty much abandoned my written journal in favor of writing here.  We'll see how far it goes.  I'm trying a lot harder to create a blend of writing:  Personal stuff, historic stuff, travel blogging... more getting back to my roots in blogging.  Over the years I've split my blogs by topic, merged them, deleted them, curated posts... just about everything.  I'm a person who loves order, and I wanted my blogs to reflect that.  I wanted a blog that was JUST about the things I saw and did... more a travel blog.  I wanted a blog that JUST reflected political and social views.  I wanted a blog that JUST had my poetry and writing.   But life is messy, and one thing this pandemic is teaching me is to embrace that mess.

So The Radula is going back to it's roots... reaching back more than a decade and a half.  There's a sense of mourning for some of the writing I've lost:  Some political posts.  A lot of posts about dealing with my eldest son's schizophrenia and my youngest son's autism.  And some posts about the struggles of poverty and brushes with homelessness.  Those are all as much a part of my life... a part of life for many people... as whale watches and nature center hikes.  Maybe more so.