Diaries, Journals, Logs - do you keep them, and why and how?

[Pellice]

I mentioned something about this in the Hobbies thread, then did a quick search of ER and couldn't find much at all. That surprised me. Maybe photography has taken over that function.

I occasionally kept them over the years, but didn't hit my stride until retirement. The ones from my youth and young adulthood were sparse and filled with misery, self-doubt, and self-admonitions and self-improvement efforts. As I was reorganizing after retirement, I came across a couple and ended up throwing them out. I'm not that person anymore and don't need to read any of that again. When I started birding, I kept a few records describing sightings and locations in handwritten booklets that I can't seem to find now. Then I migrated online to the old Sidekick (remember that??) and kept some records which were lost to either computer crashes or obsolescence of software. (sad, as I would like to have read them).

Once I retired, I got better and better at keeping a diary, and have now managed daily entries for more than 2 years. Mine is a diary, not a journal, more a record of daily activities than deep thoughts or summaries of current events. I find if I don't do it the days escape me and run together, and I wonder "where did the time go." With a diary, I can pretty easily recall things.

With the decline of steady correspondence, I wonder how historians of the future will piece together the daily experiences of individuals. One reason I dislike texting for more than immediate needs is that it provides no record and no context. I wonder whether historians would be more interested in musings about current events or crises, or whether they'd really love to know about how we spent our time!

What about you? Do you keep any kind of daily record? If so, what kind? Is it paper or online? Why do you keep it? I use MS OneNote because of the superior formatting and indexing capabilities. Each year is a new file with 12 tabs by month and notes arranged in daily order with subject headings composed of a few keywords about what was most memorable for that day. I made a template that makes it easy to record a brief mention of weather and whether I did my exercise or a bird trip that day. Sounds more complicated than it is! I'd actually like to put more effort (e.g. upload a photo or two) than I do, but haven't found the time yet. Have any of you found superior journaling applications?

I thought about making this a poll, but believe there are probably too few doing this to make it worthwhile.

 

[Alan]

I thought about making this a poll, but believe there are probably too few doing this to make it worthwhile.

No, I don't keep a diary or journal, offline or online.

 

[pacergal]

I had one as a kid ( I think many girls did). Burned it when I got older, dint want to re read that teenage angst!

DH and I wrote many letters and cards to each other early in our relationship when we went to different colleges. Found them many years later and shredded them. Some things you don't want your kids to read about you!

As far as today, no, I don't journal. I know many who do.

 

[aja8888]

No, I don't keep a diary or journal, offline or online.

Same here.

 

[MichaelB]

I think many of the posts in this forum are similar to journal entries.

 

[RunningBum]

My Garmin watch, synced with Strava, gives me a log of my running. I don't make a whole lot of use of it other than tracking mileage on each shoe, but occasionally I do go back and look at training cycles, places I've run, mile split times on past races, things like that.

 

[MC Rider]

A long time ago I took it out to the alley and burned it after the Ex got into it.
Have not kept one since, except for vacation sometimes.
To some extent photos have taken over.

 

[Gumby]

I keep a daily journal whenever we travel. Reading them, even years later, immediately brings a clear picture to mind of all the lovely experiences we have had.

I also keep a journal regarding my garden, so that I can, for example, find out how long after I planted them the watermelons germinated last year. Or figure out what worked best to kill the bean beetles. I only make an entry when I go to the garden or do something else garden related, like start seeds in my kitchen. But that is usually daily from the beginning of March through the end of October.

 

[iloveyoga]

I have kept written journals for years. I discovered that I like to write! They are in small journal books here and there in our house. Not sure if anyone other than me would ever be interested. I don't write every day and sometimes I write to myself.

I also make garden notes for next year and refer to my pictures for things that need moved or changed in the spring.

I have a yoga teacher who has always encouraged journaling and included it in her workshops, so that is how I got started.

 

[timbervest]

I was never a journaler (tried unsuccessfully a few times). On a related note, I bemoan the loss of regular written records since the advent of the digital age. Recently my sister sent me several years of correspondence that my father had written to my mother when he was stationed overseas in the 40's and 50's. They are detailed and give a great insight into his life and thoughts at the time. Unfortunately tweets just don't do the same

 

[ls99]

No journaling. That would be telling

 

[steelyman]

The best journal I’ve read is Jonathan Harker’s journal in the classic novel Dracula by Bram Stoker.

Now that guy REALLY had something to write about! [emoji3]

[ADDED] In case you haven’t read it, the novel consists mostly of journal entries and letters by the principal characters (except the Count himself). Very readable despite the fact that it was published in 1897 and plenty of free e-versions out there.

 

[FLSUnFIRE]

I have in a notebook for the last couple years. Mostly what happened between the last entry and occasionally my mood and deeper thoughts. I'm sporadic but rare that I miss more than a week. I don't write as much as I thought I would and not sure the value other than interesting to look back on at some point. I've kept a journal a few other times in life but always fizzled out.. those I usually started when "stuff" was happening so I sound like I was mostly unhappy reading those since when things got good I was enjoying the good and not brooding in the journal. This one is much more balanced and overwhelmingly positive.



I also started a "ships log" for my paddling at the start of the year. 22 ventures so far.

 

[googily]

My father has kept a diary of the contents of his days (as opposed to the contents of his soul) for probably 30 years. I know he refers back to them from time to time when trying to remember something.

I started it last year, though I did it for a number of years in an app I built to track my weight (yeah yeah). I'm doing it in a day book now, and I find it oddly relaxing to take maybe five minutes late in the day to document the day. Feels like something I will keep doing.

 

[Ronstar]

I keep daily notes. Not notes of things that I've done, but notes of ideas, sketches, items to buy, etc.

 

[DrRoy]

During the Great Recession I kept a journal about what I did with my investments and why. Now I just log the portfolio value and AA monthly. When DW and I travel, we keep a journal of our daily activities to include in the photo book that we make about the trip afterward.

 

[Lsbcal]

I have Excel files for a few things:

1) Tasks, exercise, past reads and future reads, gardening, car upkeep - generally updated daily. For exercise it is one tab per year to record running miles, shoe wear miles, walking miles

2) Investments file: diary tab is for investment thoughts. I try to keep this very concise so not too many sentences per year. The other tabs are one sheet showing portfolio for each year. Have this back to at least 2005.

I don't keep any chronicle of an emotional nature. Maybe I should?

 

[Banks2Skook]

I could have written your post. I too have angst-ridden teenaged journals, and have journaled off-and-on throughout my lifetime. Over the last decade, I’ve toggled between OneNote and a handwritten journal. Currently I use a handwritten journal -Lechturm - with a lot of colored pens. I enjoy the tactical experience and I, like you, find that the days blend together unless I keep a journal.

These days I keep a journal for my own use rather than thinking about history, simply as a daily reference. At some point, I’ll have to start thinking whether I should destroy them or leave them to posterity. Not sure that I would like my kids reading through the more - uh - “interesting” entries.

 

[Pellice]

Interesting - I knew that likely few people were keeping a journal, but it seems as though it's *really* few. And I was surprised that those of us who had the "angst-ridden" stuff from earlier years have mostly jettisoned them! There's so much advice out there to keep a journal with thoughts and feelings, etc. But I didn't want to look at them again, and I'm glad I tossed it. Somewhere I came across a mention of a journal's taking the motto of a sundial as its own: "I only mark the hours that shine." That's my current mode.

I would like to include more observations of historical interest, but haven't really done so yet. It may be that I get that out of my system here and in other places.

 

[Act2]

I don’t keep one. But I’ve inherited one that my mother kept as a young woman. Unfortunately, it is in a language I do not read well, so it’s contents are not known to me. I might have someone translate it someday. Or not.

 

[Koolau]

You rarely hear a good ending to a missing diary story. (There's a current story afoot but I'll mention no names.) I'm sure most are never stolen or read by inappropriate people. BUT that does happen enough - with the stories getting into the tabloids or on mainstream media that I'd never consider keeping one - not that my life is that interesting. YMMV

 

[NW-Bound]

I have been keeping a text file on my computer for more than 20 years. In it, each day I logged the total value of my entire investable assets as reported by MS Money and now Quicken, and the values of the 3 indices Dow, S&P, and Nasdaq.

The idea is that I can scan through the text file really quick to remind myself how much money I lost then regained in past financial fiascos, mainly the tech bubble burst in 2000 and 9/11 effects, and the subprime mortgage blowup. It becomes a habit, and I have been adding a line to this text file every day.

Then, because this is a file that I maintain, I had the idea of adding some rare info to it as reminders. For example, on a particular day I may add a comment "Start of Alaska RV trip". Or "Released from hospital". Or "Fed raised rate 3/4%". Most of the days had no comments, only portfolio and index values.

No feelings, no personal sentimental notes. Just plain boring facts.

 

[FLSUnFIRE]

Since FIRE, I have a notebook with each day of the week and things I have planned/to do... It actually serves as a pretty good journal of what I did -or at least planned to do. I have occasionally flipped back trying to remember when I did X.

 

[YVRRocketSurgery]

Looking back, I wish I kept a journal over the years because I love reminiscing.

Over recent years, I've kept notes but they're scattered all over the place including giving big tech all my info.

In my financial spreadsheet, I have a worksheet that originally served as a countdown to my retirement that included a number of columns for different category of things I needed to do, did, or be aware of. I've kept it going but now it's counting up from retirement. It was kind of simpler to have it as a planner in my financial spreadsheet instead of a calendar because it was an easy layout and I'm always going into the spreadsheet.

I let my Pixel phone and Google maps track my location (which I suppose could come back and bite me on my rear ). Google maps has a notes feature where I put down notes ahead of time of what's recommended and then after about what I ate at a particular restaurant so if I go back, I can recall what I've ordered in the past and if I wanted to order it again.

During trips, I do take notes in Google docs to track our spend, where we went, and what we did.

I let the missus take all the pictures on her phone which gets loaded onto the cloud so we occasionally get reminders of "This day 5 years ago..."

 

[RetireBy90]

I use calendar app on phone to record some things, dr appts, volunteering, and when I mowed the lawn. Lawn is cause I don’t remember ��
Also use a log of bills due and when paid again memory assist.��