Unbalanced Sanity
Today I am grateful for rain and enlightening news stories. I am grateful to be learning more about today's celebration of Juneteenth.
I was going through a small storage area yesterday and moved some of my journals to a new home. It presented this photo opp:
The stack in the top photo started teetering a little so I had to stabilize it with a couple fingers. The bottom photo offered more stability. That is nearly thirty various journals right there. And that is not my complete collection, which is probably closing in on fifty. I have done A LOT of writing. A LOT.
A friend and I were talking a few weeks ago about what we might do with our journals. As we get older, we are considering who might see them after we die and if we want that. It is something I am giving more thought to now in midlife.
I have been journaling to my son Sam since before he was born. I think I am on #6 now. He knows they exist and has looked at them a little. Those are for him and his family. Full of details about his life so far, I hope they will be treasured. Writing in them has been part of my treasure and has deepened my love for and connection to my only child.
My gratitude journals would probably get redundant to a reader, but they are fairly innocuous. And they don't feel redundant to me each morning when I write fresh gratitudes.
I have journals full of poems, others more like a diary of my life events and emotions. There are facts and details in there that I would have otherwise forgotten. There are emotions and struggles throughout the pages as well.
This is when I arrive where I always arrive when I think about what writing has done for me. It has saved my life. Brought me sanity as a recovering alcoholic. Continues to bring clarity and reason when the most significant challenges of my life have come along through the decades.
Some of my writing would pain others to read, some of my words would offend. I will shelter loved ones from that writing. Some has already been burned. At the same time, I am forever grateful for being able to bring the most painful and transformative words to paper. When I have found myself emotionally unbalanced, pen to paper has been one of my best avenues back to stability.
Have a good weekend! I will be back blogging next week.
I was going through a small storage area yesterday and moved some of my journals to a new home. It presented this photo opp:
The stack in the top photo started teetering a little so I had to stabilize it with a couple fingers. The bottom photo offered more stability. That is nearly thirty various journals right there. And that is not my complete collection, which is probably closing in on fifty. I have done A LOT of writing. A LOT.
A friend and I were talking a few weeks ago about what we might do with our journals. As we get older, we are considering who might see them after we die and if we want that. It is something I am giving more thought to now in midlife.
I have been journaling to my son Sam since before he was born. I think I am on #6 now. He knows they exist and has looked at them a little. Those are for him and his family. Full of details about his life so far, I hope they will be treasured. Writing in them has been part of my treasure and has deepened my love for and connection to my only child.
My gratitude journals would probably get redundant to a reader, but they are fairly innocuous. And they don't feel redundant to me each morning when I write fresh gratitudes.
I have journals full of poems, others more like a diary of my life events and emotions. There are facts and details in there that I would have otherwise forgotten. There are emotions and struggles throughout the pages as well.
This is when I arrive where I always arrive when I think about what writing has done for me. It has saved my life. Brought me sanity as a recovering alcoholic. Continues to bring clarity and reason when the most significant challenges of my life have come along through the decades.
Some of my writing would pain others to read, some of my words would offend. I will shelter loved ones from that writing. Some has already been burned. At the same time, I am forever grateful for being able to bring the most painful and transformative words to paper. When I have found myself emotionally unbalanced, pen to paper has been one of my best avenues back to stability.
Have a good weekend! I will be back blogging next week.
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