Diaries... who keeps them and why?

I keep one, for a bunch of reasons. It can be fun to look back on what I was thinking or feeling a long time ago; it's a great way to relive moments, good or bad. I also find that writing about something is a good way to release some steam, sort of like sounding off to someone when you need to. And sometimes I just like the physical act of using a pen--it's sort of relaxing in the same way that taking a walk or listening to music can be--and keeping a journal is a good excuse for doing so.

When I was young I used to keep one and treated it like a friend, that lasted about a year.
About 2 years ago my friend got married and I was helping her with arrarngements, I was also a bridesmaid so we had to meet up for rehearsals and etc's and as my memory was getting bad(old age) I got myself a diary to put times in, I found it very helpful and have continued to use them,Ive just bought a new diary for 2007.

I keep travel diaries so I know how we got somewhere, how much it was, where good places to eat were, etc.

It's fun looking back

Ahem, journal....would be my preferred description, I have kept one more or less most of my life, handwritten up until the mid 90's when I switched over to "Word". Pretty basic stuff most of the time, work and such, I usually list the books that I buy, or movies that we watch..and of course if something drastic or interesting happens. Here is a normal days entry.


MARCH 14TH WED {2001}
Laid the floor in no time flat...got home before 11, so I went with Angie to the doctors office. The doc said Connor was fine, so no worries there....we went to Kirby's for lunch, then I went to Collins Music and bought a new guitar strap. It's really cool, it's got pool balls on it. Then we went to K-Mart and the outlet mall....I got a Stevie Ray Vaughan video and a book about letters.....not ABC's, but letters that people have written each other, some famous some not. It has several that Mark Twain wrote....that's the main reason I bought it. Tried to play the guitar but I was too tired, almost fell asleep in my chair. We went back at 4 to grout the floor, took less than an hour....came back home and I was very sleepy so we didn't do much at all.

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In one of Boomers threads about buying a gift for her nephew, I mentioned buying the guitar strap...so if for some reason, I had to know the exact date that I purchased it...I would know.

I often use code words...Latin, German, or simple metaphors to hide things that I do not want to forget, but do not want anyone to know.

I have a calendar/diary as an external hard drive to my brain.
I don't keep the 'I'll tell you all my secret thoughts'- kind of diary any more.

Used to as a child, but destroyed them, before I left home for a year, since I did not want anybody finding and reading them.

As well as keeping a diary/journal, whenever I went on a holiday, I'd use a small tape recorder and I'd talk into it and mention all sorts of things along the way, from the mileage (speedometer reading), petrol prices in the various towns as we drove through them, and any interesting sights that might appear on our travels.
Hubby's been gone a year now, and when I played back one of the old tapes from 1996, his voice was on it and I was able to relive that trip all over again.
People who don't keep records of some sort about their lives just don't know what they are missing out on.
Even though I no longer have them, I remember keeping a diary from school days, and I even used to write down how much pocket-money I got and what I spent it on... down to one penny paid to use a public toilet. Sometimes if/when I wanted to write down something 'secret' I'd use shorthand that only I could decipher. Now I've only got about 30 years of diaries, and I hate to admit that there are some empty pages in them, so each New Years Day I reiterate my New Year's Resolution yet again..."Write in my diary every day. Do not let one page go empty". Even if I feel like I am living Ground Hog days... it's good to know I have lived one more day.

I've always kept a diary (well journal I guess) since my early teens. I haven't always been faithful to write in it, but the longest I seem to be able to go without writing in it is a few months. I write daily now. It helps to let out steam as you said. I also like it because I can re-read what I've wrote and see from a different angle what I'm thinking which helps to keep life in perspective sometimes. A lot of my journal entries from my early 20's when I was struggling through a lot of childhood issues are going to be used in my book. It was pretty neat to go back and read them and see the process I went through in order to get where I am today. I thought maybe it could be helpful to others to see it too. *shrugs* We'll see I guess.

Journal and Diary, mean basically the same thing...at least the definitions of both are typically identical. Usually, diary will have a more private or personal or secret slant to it's definition, whereas journal tends to be more general...a record of ones experiences, daily or otherwise.

Personally though, I tend to equate diary to a female....journal could be for either, but diary is definitely gender specific, in my tiny caveman mind.


Dear Diary,
Today was a wonderful day! On my way home from work, I was waiting at a stoplight, and I saw a little girl playing with a puppy, a nice breeze was blowing her blonde hair into her eyes, she looked so cute trying to brush it back, I smiled and waved at her, and she waved back. She reminded me of Becky, my childhood friend that suddenly moved to Buffalo and we never got to say goodbye, I wonder where she is now, I miss you Becky wherever you are. Then I noticed the little girls mother, she was wearing the cutest dress, I started to roll down my window and ask her where she got it but the light changed and some guy behind me started honking his horn, so I drove away. The rest of the way home I kept thinking about the little girl and her mother, I wonder what their names are, I'm guessing Ashley and June. I'm thinking about making them a cake, and I'll pick up a nice card at Jo Jo's this weekend, because they are having a big sale.

Journal Day 5
I talked to my probation officer again, he said if I wanted early release I HAD to write in this damn thing every day no matter what. Work sucked, Jack kept yelling at me all day even though I told him I had a hangover, so I pushed a pack of shingles off the roof, but I missed him completely, lucky bastard. On the way home, at a stoplight I saw some chick with a short skirt, the wind kept blowing it up, I think she liked it, I know I did. The light turned green but the dipshit in front of me must have been sleeping or something so I layed on the horn until she finally moved, I think the chick in the skirt was impressed by my loud horn. She had big jugs, I think the girl in the car had big jugs too, when I got home I drank a gallon of milk, then spent a few hours downloading porn. My ass itches.

I kept a journal for many years, adding up to about 60 books plus several ledger pads and about 100 or so pages when I started keeping it on the computer. I carry this fear that something will happen to me and my journals will be found and read by my husband or stepchildren (who I've had some difficult times with and wrote about in less than glowing terms) so the plan is to find a big wooden box, pile them all in, lock it and take it to my sister's house.

In the meantime, they're locked away in a metal file.

LOL 2packs!

I can understand locking them up eoe. Mine are in a well hidden place as well.

Hiding diaries seems to be becoming a big feature on this thread and I must admit it's a concern that I share.

I kept diaries religiously when I was younger and more troubled.

Has anybody read Kafka's diaries? those who knew him said that his diaries reflected only the gloomy, introspective side of his character and that he could actually be quite a funny and entertaining chap but he rarely wrote about that side of his life!

I think this is because Kafka used diaries as a way of exorcising his demons and I must admit I think I have used diaries in a similar way.

Anybody reading them would think I was a totally introspective and hyper self critical sort of person but that isn't the complete picture of me at all. It's just that I don't seem to need to write about the happier times in my life with the same degree of absorbtion as I do the difficult and self-doubting times. I havn't written in my 2006 diary for over a month.

I wonder if anybody could explain why this is?

Because you are using your diary to express thoughts you cannot or will not express to other people. (Which is perfectly alright.)

When life is going well, there is little need to question it, complain about it, do any soul searching...etc.

Most of my days are summed up in one little nice neat paragraph. But I do have several that contain a couple of thousand words each.

General....Diaries
Vonda 1941;

I do not keep a diary however each day I must write down..Jobs to do around the house and of cvourse what I will have to buy at the food store....So dont feel bad for sooner or later everyone will be doing the same thing.

Here's a question that randomly occurred to me: for those of you who keep diaries or journals, do you write in the first-person or the second-person (or even the third-person) voice? I never really took note of my own habits until recently, and I've found that I almost always write in the second-person.

Since this thread has been revived (and since I never saw it earlier), I will now respond to both the opening inquiry and to this one from Shapeless.


The only time I ever kept a daily log (diary just sounded to sissy for me and journal sounded too difficult), was when a close friend was dying of cancer back in '94 and '95 (left the Earth that November). I did it mainly as a way to keep from losing my mind. He didn't have family or too many friends and I was there every day; but, at the end of the day I needed a way to get the built up pressures out of myself. I always wrote in first-person.

There were days when all I had the energy or need for was a few short sentences and other times 2 or 3 or more pages would be written out. Like the day the doctor asked me if I thought my friend had accepted the fact that he was dying. Hell, I hadn't gotten that far yet! The last entries of the log were in the first months after his death. My sister said I should turn it into a book to help others, I just put it away in a drawer. It's personal and private and needs to stay that way out of respect for John.

It's been suggested that I turn the 60 books I have into a novel of some kind also but I'm still way too embarrassed by alot of what I wrote concerning my sad-ass lovelife back then to publicize it. At least, not under my own name.

Second person?







That's brilliant. That changes the whole thing.

Except when I write things to myself I usually omit the "I" entirely. Like Withnail, only without it he'd just be Wthnal.

I keep a diary because I am a writer and it keeps my mind limber between gigs. It's also double passcode protected on my computer so the FBI can't read it.