Packing
In the midst of packing up my room (and my life) I came across my diary from age 10. Spelling errors have been kept intact to help preserve authenticity...
2/12/93
Dear Diary,
Today was are school valentine party. I had a great time. Untill I got home. You see I have a crush on a girl named Sarah seacne kindergraten. Today I called her and she told me she had a crush on Ryan. She also told me not to tell anyone so just in case I thout I will plant a fake. (It is not this one). Anyway she broke my heart. After I thout she liked me alot. (It means had a crush on me.) But I guese not.
(sad face) good bye (crying face)
Zachary
Entry number 2
2-16-93
Dear Diary,
For a while I was to chicken to tell **** I had a crush on her. But tonight we were doing homework together on the phone (I can't bileve I told her this!) and I told her I had a crush on her. She was speachless, all she said was in her diary she said she thought Ryan was cute, and I was neat! She was so stuned she said she had to go and then she hung up. But I feel so much better now!
(happy face) Zachary (happy face)
8-29-93
Dear Diary,
I'm sorry I have not writen for a while. I just have been busy. Anyway I don't have a crush on Sarah any more, were just friends. I sorta have a crush on Sidney, a girl at our school. Sidney is very poperler to boys! A lot of other things have happend. I am taking violin, I am in exel (otherwise known as tag). About 8 months ago I got a retainer and I can't eat any gum or sticky candy (and I couldn't take it out). Well anyway, I got it out about 3 days ago.
Yours truly,
Zachary
So much drama in the early years. It's funny, I can remember writing in my diary, as if I were writing to myself as an adult. Seeing it as a time machine to talk with my future self, I figured by that time I would forget all the colloquialisms, i.e. "a crush", of the time period- now some 13 years past, so I attempted to explain them in depth. I never though that I'd instead look back and laugh at myself, or even worse betray my "crush's" secret and now post it on the internet for all to see. I'm obviously not to be trusted. How was that little person ever me? Or rather how was I ever that 10 year old? Will I look back in another 13 years at these entries and wounder how I could have been so blind or unaware?
What follows those sordid writtings are scattered entries, most written on New Year's Eves, with resolutions reading more or less "get in shape, get a girlfriend, be nicer to everyone (including my brothers)"
Ahhh nostalgia- what a comical/foolish lens you make us view our past lives through.
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As I was saying above, I'm currently attempting to sort the past 23 years of my life in boxes. My brother and I have recently procured an apartment in downtown and we move on the 3rd. But seeing as how I've honestly never thrown anything away in my life (as anyone who has seen my room can attest to), it's proving to be quite the challenge. I have boxes upon boxes for old school assignments and assorted knickknacks. Do I really need the quilted pillow diagram of a cell structure, with different patterns representing the nucleolus and other various parts, I made for 6th grade science? Or the many random books (Yiddish with Dick and Jane, Taxi Driver Wisdom) or hobby/self-improvement books (watercolor painting, sleight of hand, spanish/italian/french/latin grammar, hypnosis for beginners) and all those unread novels I've picked up at Powells and Borders that I will probably never ever read?
I feel such guilt in throwing anything away. As if I'm betraying my past self who created, bought, collected, or received all this junk. I place so much of myself in that which I have (typical Taurus), that I feel I am throwing part of myself away every time I toss out an old movie ticket stub, birthday card, or even old spanish assignment. I fear forgetting who I was, or in essence who I am. Each piece, toy, book, scrap of paper, is a key to a memory. Maybe it'd be a good exercise to start throwing some of it away. Therapy even.
What I own, owns me.
2/12/93
Dear Diary,
Today was are school valentine party. I had a great time. Untill I got home. You see I have a crush on a girl named Sarah seacne kindergraten. Today I called her and she told me she had a crush on Ryan. She also told me not to tell anyone so just in case I thout I will plant a fake. (It is not this one). Anyway she broke my heart. After I thout she liked me alot. (It means had a crush on me.) But I guese not.
(sad face) good bye (crying face)
Zachary
Entry number 2
2-16-93
Dear Diary,
For a while I was to chicken to tell **** I had a crush on her. But tonight we were doing homework together on the phone (I can't bileve I told her this!) and I told her I had a crush on her. She was speachless, all she said was in her diary she said she thought Ryan was cute, and I was neat! She was so stuned she said she had to go and then she hung up. But I feel so much better now!
(happy face) Zachary (happy face)
8-29-93
Dear Diary,
I'm sorry I have not writen for a while. I just have been busy. Anyway I don't have a crush on Sarah any more, were just friends. I sorta have a crush on Sidney, a girl at our school. Sidney is very poperler to boys! A lot of other things have happend. I am taking violin, I am in exel (otherwise known as tag). About 8 months ago I got a retainer and I can't eat any gum or sticky candy (and I couldn't take it out). Well anyway, I got it out about 3 days ago.
Yours truly,
Zachary
So much drama in the early years. It's funny, I can remember writing in my diary, as if I were writing to myself as an adult. Seeing it as a time machine to talk with my future self, I figured by that time I would forget all the colloquialisms, i.e. "a crush", of the time period- now some 13 years past, so I attempted to explain them in depth. I never though that I'd instead look back and laugh at myself, or even worse betray my "crush's" secret and now post it on the internet for all to see. I'm obviously not to be trusted. How was that little person ever me? Or rather how was I ever that 10 year old? Will I look back in another 13 years at these entries and wounder how I could have been so blind or unaware?
What follows those sordid writtings are scattered entries, most written on New Year's Eves, with resolutions reading more or less "get in shape, get a girlfriend, be nicer to everyone (including my brothers)"
Ahhh nostalgia- what a comical/foolish lens you make us view our past lives through.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
As I was saying above, I'm currently attempting to sort the past 23 years of my life in boxes. My brother and I have recently procured an apartment in downtown and we move on the 3rd. But seeing as how I've honestly never thrown anything away in my life (as anyone who has seen my room can attest to), it's proving to be quite the challenge. I have boxes upon boxes for old school assignments and assorted knickknacks. Do I really need the quilted pillow diagram of a cell structure, with different patterns representing the nucleolus and other various parts, I made for 6th grade science? Or the many random books (Yiddish with Dick and Jane, Taxi Driver Wisdom) or hobby/self-improvement books (watercolor painting, sleight of hand, spanish/italian/french/latin grammar, hypnosis for beginners) and all those unread novels I've picked up at Powells and Borders that I will probably never ever read?
I feel such guilt in throwing anything away. As if I'm betraying my past self who created, bought, collected, or received all this junk. I place so much of myself in that which I have (typical Taurus), that I feel I am throwing part of myself away every time I toss out an old movie ticket stub, birthday card, or even old spanish assignment. I fear forgetting who I was, or in essence who I am. Each piece, toy, book, scrap of paper, is a key to a memory. Maybe it'd be a good exercise to start throwing some of it away. Therapy even.
What I own, owns me.