Why keep a diary

My 2012 diary

Maybe writing in a daybook is my praying. Talking to someone I don't know but believe in.

'Never abandon the wholesome practice of saying your own private prayers, night and morning. I have never abandoned it myself, and I know the comfort of it,' wrote Charles Dickens to his son.

Wholesome: promoting health or well-being of mind or spirit. A telling of the last twenty-four hours' events and thoughts soothes me.

It's more than putting memories, feelings and ideas in a vault for safe-keeping and posterity (I seldom re-read my journals anyway). It is a way of affirming the day. Today can only be complete if I re-call, re-assess, and re-construct it in words.

Wholesome: based on well-grounded fear. What is the consequence of missing a log? That what happened is not captured and made sense of, and is therefore meaningless and untrue.