DEAR DIARY

The prospect of reading someone's diary can be titillating, perhaps a little brassy and reckless.  There's a boundary that one crosses opening the cover to unearth another's deepest, darkest secrets.  It's like digging around in your mother's underwear drawer; there's some places you just don't go! 

Sitting here with this diary in my hand feels all wrong.  I don't know her anymore, do I have a right?  I made a vow to myself years ago that, if ever I stumbled upon someone's diary, I would NEVER read it.  Maybe that's why my hands are trembling now.  Do I?  Don't I?  

I peak gingerly at the first page, just to confirm my suspicions.  This is indeed a diary - first page entry dated June 28, 1976.  The handwriting is tiny and swoopy, with little hearts for "i" dots.  I hardly recognize it.  But then why would I?  It was 37 years ago.  

I don't even know at this moment why I've dug it from its covert location, deep in the recesses of my steamer trunk where a collection of relics languish, awaiting a day when they'll become relevant again.  And why am I afraid to dive in?  I'm not sure I want to resurrect all that stuff again, that's why.  What if I don't like who she was?  Perhaps I've allowed a level of post-youth memory loss to cloud those turbulent years.  Neuroscience would have a name for it: Post Youthful Stupidity Dissociative Condition.  A condition not intended to be messed with, I'm sure.

Against my better judgment I begin to read and I'm pulled in like a psychopath to his next victim.  It's hard to read past all of the boo- hoo-ing and woe-is-me.  Was life really that hard as a 13 year old in the funky, flower-child days of the 1970's?  And then it gets interesting.  I strap myself in - this could be a wild ride.  

Dear Diary, it continues, as though powwowing with a confidante.  The pages are laced with details of all of those impetus moments, the events that set the stage for maturity: boyfriends and break-ups, parties and concerts, friends and fights.  She takes me on a journey that I didn't know I wanted to return to.  

At times I wince.  She really did lead that boy on.  It's no wonder he followed her around like a hyena on the prowl for years to come, burning her initials into his forearm, not knowing when to give up the chase.  

At times I'm saddened, realizing that her high school education collided with a time in her life when she had such a blatant disregard for anything cerebral.  "You coulda been a contenda, kid,"  I remind her.  

And then I smile, the roller coaster peaks and the butterflys set in - she's found love.  Young, idealistic, unobstructed love.  Of course, its not all uphill from here but her entire attitude swivels around on its axis, and she's focused outside her self-absorbed center.  Hm, funny how certain people can do that to you.

I turn the last page and I'm glad I read it - apart from the parts that should have remained latent in my memory's vault of Lost & Forgotten Things.  And I don't feel guilty.  I realize now she wrote it for me.  She wrote it knowing that, way far away in the great somewhere, I'd find the diary again and relive it.  She was a part of me, afterall, and to disown her would be denying her an earned and merited place in my life.