I don’t like talking to myself and I don’t like listening to myself. It’s probably not a surprise that my few attempts at journaling ended up fighting the dust bunnies for shelf space in short order.
I made a few attempts in high school and college. I thought I ought to. But I hated writing by hand. My hands would start being very painful after a few paragraphs. I also had difficulties finding time to do it. I liked to devote all my free time to science fiction or television or something like that.
But mostly, I can’t write if I don’t know who I am writing to. I guess a lot of people can write to themselves, but I can’t Other people might be interested in reading what I have to say, but I don’t. I never go back and read anything I wrote. I never edit. I quickly forget what I wrote. Which means all the questions are fresh to me most of the time.
I like to answer questions because they take me on a path of discovery when I answer. I can write to a real person when I answer. Someone who will probably read it, because they are interested in the answer. Writing to myself would be an utter waste of time. It would be torture. I would hate the way I wrote about things, even if I was interested in what I wrote about.
I have kept every single letter I wrote since I 18, and if I could tolerate it, maybe those would be a journal. But most of my letters are beyond embarrassing. I used to think I was saving them for someone after I died, if they became interested in my life. That was back when I thought I’d do something interesting. But now that I think about it, it’s probably time to go back and burn everything, and create space for new things. It is usually acutely embarrassing to read that crap—like when your mother shows your new girlfriend pictures of you as a one year old, smearing your own shit on the walls.
There are no pictures that I know of, but my Mother tells me I did that. What’s worse, she tells other people.
Are you happy now, @seazen_ ?