Week Two: The why's and how's of writing

At various points in my life, I have kept journals. I have one from when I was 8 years old, it’s pink, with a ballerina on the front. I have another from when I was 14-16, with sharpie all over the front and the back, saying “keep out” and “private.” The last one I have is powder blue, with flowers on the front, and was used sporadically starting at 21 to present day. Currently, I do not write in any journal, though a friend gave me one at my baby shower, so I could write about being a mom. I have yet to start but I would like to. I suppose my main reason for not writing in my journal is being forgetful or busy, and I don’t make it a priority over other things like laundry, interacting with my daughter and our dogs, or whatever has to be done at home next.

            I definitely was a part of the boom in social media and online writing when I was in middle school mostly, and I used facebook in high school. In middle school however, I frequently used livejournal and myspace. Yes, I think that the perfect definition of oversharing would be the average 13 year old that was on livejournal and myspace. We put everything on there, it didn’t matter what it was. My friends and I spent hours and hours on our computers, learning how to tweak the html of the profile to make them unique with different fonts, setups, and colors. When we fought with family members, or each other, we ran to either our physical journals or our livejournals. My dad was a total tech geek and we had tons of computers at our house, running this special program. The purpose of this program was to virtually fold cells to discover what exactly happens to a person’s cells when they develop Alzheimer’s. It was really cool. But anyways, I lived on my computer for several years. I loved being able to read my friend’s journals, and loved to write in my own.

            I think many of us want to know what others are thinking, how they are feeling, and what they like or don’t like. We could want to know someone better or just be naturally curious, as people usually are. The online diary provides people with a view of each other that we did not have before. To get to see something that was so private for a long time, makes people even more curious, because it is sort of taboo. I think people also appreciate the ability to relate to others on a larger scale. The internet provides a potential community unlike any other. For example, I had my daughter in September, but for my entire pregnancy I was a part of a group of over 2,000 women from around the world, on a subreddit, for women with due dates in September 2019. It was much easier to tell them my anxieties about life and being a mother than it was to tell people in real life.

            So much of what I personally put online is an expression of my every day life. Randomly selected passing moments. I think that most writers probably do write in stream of consciousness mode. Writing about their day, their interactions with others, their lunch. But this is also a great way to reflect on a person’s life and come to an understanding of good or bad situations. Writing is sort of like therapy. You write it down, see the words on the paper, and sometimes see something in a new light. Both the original author and the readers definitely should and can take something away from what they are reading. If they relate to it, and it speaks to them, it is just one person helping another, or many others.

            Writing online is certainly different than writing in a journal/dairy. One aspect of writing that should stay the same, is the way we write. In a traditional diary, as well as online, I feel that grammar and punctuation are very important. I think there’s a difference in name dropping when going from physical to virtual diaries. If it is a personal story, some people may be offended at being mentioned by name since there is such a large audience, so I think that respecting someone’s privacy becomes something we have to be concerned about that is different from writing in a physical book diary.