What an ENORMOUS honor to be here with you, Kelly. Just — well. It makes me wish, even more, that you and Abby and I could sit and talk together someday, about all the things we love. (We could also talk about the things we don't love. Because, well, those also exist.) Thank you for thinking of me, for including me. xo
I am so thrilled to be able to showcase your beautiful work AND the way you think about it. Your journals, and the words inside them, are works of art, and your book My Life in Paper is such a favorite (along with many of your other books, like Handling the Truth and Wife/Daughter/Self). Thank you for trusting me and for showing me your diary!
"It’s important to me that I write my words into something that I’ve made." Your one of a kind notebooks look so beautiful. The anniversary book sounds amazing, thank you for sharing that with us fellow journal-keepers and word-lovers.
Olga, thank you — I have so much fun making those journals. And had a really meaningful time making that gift for Bill. When you get to be my age, the past, the return of the past, can feel like something brand new.
Wonderful! I have transcribed 45 years of my great grandmother’s diaries, spanning from 1871-1925, (missing the years she birthed her children🫤). It has given me amazing insight to her life and personality. I’d be happy to share some with you. I’ve been journaling myself for50 years and mine them constantly for insight as I write my essays. I also have my aunt’s, grandmother’s and grandfather’s diaries. We are a family of diarists!
Martha, this is fascinating! I am thinking of working on a special edition about the act of transcribing someone else's journals. I am doing a version of this for a book project currently and the act is so different than writing our own or simply reading someone else's. Would you please send me a note via email? kellyinbrooklyn@gmail.com
And that is SUCH a fascinating detail about the missing years. That seems to be a theme among the folks I've already interviewed...not writing is often as interesting as the writing itself!
Love this Kelly! Especially the addendum - this revelation that maybe we were always writers even before we knew we were and even when we weren’t trying so hard to make the writing perfect. How beautiful.
Oh my gosh, I enjoyed reading this piece. Of course for the detail about Beth’s writing and art and self-reflexivity… but also because I recently made some attempts at creating some blank journals, including one I made and decorated for the purpose of taking it on the trip to London and Paris and Cambridge I just returned from. I made the book pretty small, with a mixture of several different types of paper. The trip was a group trip with some members of my choir, for the purpose of singing a concert at Ely Cathedral. I used some photocopies of the music to decorate the cover of the little book and to form some of the pages. As things happened, I had to really shoehorn in any writing during the trip. I was with a group, there was a schedule of activities, there was a crowd at breakfast in the hotel in the mornings, there was real fatigue at points during the days and at night, there were pubs to find for a traditional dinner, there were several full days of rehearsal. I felt I couldn’t really squirrel myself away at breakfast and write and collage in my journal if it was too loud, or if I would be ignoring members of my group if they came in. As much as I liked the group and the planned activities, I did get a significant pique of frustration at one point that there was such a constraint on time for true creativity. I felt like I hadn’t had five minutes to gather my thoughts in the mornings before the chatter and the outings began. I had to set my alarm earlier — about 6:30 — the next day in order to have a quiet opportunity to jot down what I had seen and done and glue down a few words and scraps onto a page or two. There’s more to tell, but literally my husband is now waiting impatiently for me to be done typing so he can talk to me.
Oh, Elizabeth, I can't tell you how familiar this frustration is! So often. I'll have a pocket of experience (a trip, a conference, a particularly important span of time) and feel that I *must* journal and do something similar (buy a special journal, etc) only to....not crack it open. There is almost TOO MUCH pressure and I freeze. I do find that if I come to the journal at the end of that time, my brain has sort of stored up highlights to record and I am able to record with some distance, though I know I miss so much. But...something is better than nothing?
Yes, I totally understand the different types of “blocks” to writing or making art during a trip. MANY times I have optimistically packed some art materials and /or pens, pencils, and some specially selected paper in my luggage, and then found on the trip that I had no time to break them out. Most family trips are packed with activities and getting to places. I can snap some quick photos that could be good references later, but they don’t always convey the essence of being there… I don’t get to pause and take the kind of careful shots I would like to. The kind of writing I was able to do on my recent trip was really just jotting down the basics what was happening so that I would have it down because I know I will forget. Getting down a few first scraps of some tiny collages was a real challenge. There was not much extra thought or creativity, though a lot of contemplation was going on internally. I resigned myself to perhaps pursuing that focused artistry later, while contemplating my scratchings later in a calm time. It’s ok! If all you can do in the moment to start with is get down two or three more evocative words that are really buzzing around for you, that’s fine. Alternatively, all of this tells me I need to plan an art or writing centered trip, with time purposely set for creating in helpful conditions.
What an ENORMOUS honor to be here with you, Kelly. Just — well. It makes me wish, even more, that you and Abby and I could sit and talk together someday, about all the things we love. (We could also talk about the things we don't love. Because, well, those also exist.) Thank you for thinking of me, for including me. xo
I am so thrilled to be able to showcase your beautiful work AND the way you think about it. Your journals, and the words inside them, are works of art, and your book My Life in Paper is such a favorite (along with many of your other books, like Handling the Truth and Wife/Daughter/Self). Thank you for trusting me and for showing me your diary!
"It’s important to me that I write my words into something that I’ve made." Your one of a kind notebooks look so beautiful. The anniversary book sounds amazing, thank you for sharing that with us fellow journal-keepers and word-lovers.
Olga, thank you — I have so much fun making those journals. And had a really meaningful time making that gift for Bill. When you get to be my age, the past, the return of the past, can feel like something brand new.
Wonderful! I have transcribed 45 years of my great grandmother’s diaries, spanning from 1871-1925, (missing the years she birthed her children🫤). It has given me amazing insight to her life and personality. I’d be happy to share some with you. I’ve been journaling myself for50 years and mine them constantly for insight as I write my essays. I also have my aunt’s, grandmother’s and grandfather’s diaries. We are a family of diarists!
Martha, this is fascinating! I am thinking of working on a special edition about the act of transcribing someone else's journals. I am doing a version of this for a book project currently and the act is so different than writing our own or simply reading someone else's. Would you please send me a note via email? kellyinbrooklyn@gmail.com
And that is SUCH a fascinating detail about the missing years. That seems to be a theme among the folks I've already interviewed...not writing is often as interesting as the writing itself!
Reading this post in the blue twilight of dawn was the perfect way to start my morning—off to the journal now!
Thank you so much, Amie. May your journal open a world to you today.
Love this Kelly! Especially the addendum - this revelation that maybe we were always writers even before we knew we were and even when we weren’t trying so hard to make the writing perfect. How beautiful.
I'd love to talk about my diaries with you in a post one day.
Thanks, Stephen! I'm planning a special segment on reader's diaries, so stay tuned for more on that!
Oh my gosh, I enjoyed reading this piece. Of course for the detail about Beth’s writing and art and self-reflexivity… but also because I recently made some attempts at creating some blank journals, including one I made and decorated for the purpose of taking it on the trip to London and Paris and Cambridge I just returned from. I made the book pretty small, with a mixture of several different types of paper. The trip was a group trip with some members of my choir, for the purpose of singing a concert at Ely Cathedral. I used some photocopies of the music to decorate the cover of the little book and to form some of the pages. As things happened, I had to really shoehorn in any writing during the trip. I was with a group, there was a schedule of activities, there was a crowd at breakfast in the hotel in the mornings, there was real fatigue at points during the days and at night, there were pubs to find for a traditional dinner, there were several full days of rehearsal. I felt I couldn’t really squirrel myself away at breakfast and write and collage in my journal if it was too loud, or if I would be ignoring members of my group if they came in. As much as I liked the group and the planned activities, I did get a significant pique of frustration at one point that there was such a constraint on time for true creativity. I felt like I hadn’t had five minutes to gather my thoughts in the mornings before the chatter and the outings began. I had to set my alarm earlier — about 6:30 — the next day in order to have a quiet opportunity to jot down what I had seen and done and glue down a few words and scraps onto a page or two. There’s more to tell, but literally my husband is now waiting impatiently for me to be done typing so he can talk to me.
Oh, Elizabeth, I can't tell you how familiar this frustration is! So often. I'll have a pocket of experience (a trip, a conference, a particularly important span of time) and feel that I *must* journal and do something similar (buy a special journal, etc) only to....not crack it open. There is almost TOO MUCH pressure and I freeze. I do find that if I come to the journal at the end of that time, my brain has sort of stored up highlights to record and I am able to record with some distance, though I know I miss so much. But...something is better than nothing?
Yes, I totally understand the different types of “blocks” to writing or making art during a trip. MANY times I have optimistically packed some art materials and /or pens, pencils, and some specially selected paper in my luggage, and then found on the trip that I had no time to break them out. Most family trips are packed with activities and getting to places. I can snap some quick photos that could be good references later, but they don’t always convey the essence of being there… I don’t get to pause and take the kind of careful shots I would like to. The kind of writing I was able to do on my recent trip was really just jotting down the basics what was happening so that I would have it down because I know I will forget. Getting down a few first scraps of some tiny collages was a real challenge. There was not much extra thought or creativity, though a lot of contemplation was going on internally. I resigned myself to perhaps pursuing that focused artistry later, while contemplating my scratchings later in a calm time. It’s ok! If all you can do in the moment to start with is get down two or three more evocative words that are really buzzing around for you, that’s fine. Alternatively, all of this tells me I need to plan an art or writing centered trip, with time purposely set for creating in helpful conditions.
May you find that quiet envelope of time to write, to be.