2007

i know it's a couple weeks late, but yesterday i started my new year's resolution, which is to write in a journal for 2007. i originally wanted to write in it every day no matter what i did or didn't do kind of like bridget jones' diary, but it took me two weeks to buy the journal, so i can't expect myself to write in it everyday.

i like reading biographies and historical memoirs and watching movies and tv shows that are in a historical setting. they probably get a lot of the information for books and tv shows from journals and diaries that people kept. like the diary of anne frank. i remember reading that when i was young, maybe middle school, and then i went to the holocaust museum in washington dc. it's crazy to think that something like that happened and it's amazing to be able to read a young girl's candid thoughts during the holocaust. i also loved the tv show american dreams that got cancelled 3 or 4 years ago. it followed a family living their daily lives in the 1950's/60's. i like watching that because it wasn't that long ago - my parents were born in the 50's, so it's fun to get a glimpse of what their life was like growing up.

now i'm not saying anything i write in my journal is going to be historically captivating, but it will be significant to myself. i've been trying to take a lot of pictures within the past couple years and i know a picture is worth a thousand words, but not really. it will be hard to remember 20 years from now what my thoughts were by looking at a picture and it would be even harder for someone else to look at a picture of me and know what i was thinking. a journal will captivate my voice and my thoughts in the year 2007.

i loved hearing from my grandparents about what their life was like growing up and i visited ellis island and tried to picture what it was like for my great-grandparents to come over on a boat from greece 80 or 90 years ago. my grandparents are no longer alive and i remember some stories about them growing up, but i don't know as much as i would like. i recently asked my mom if she had any jewelry from either of my grandmothers. next time i went home she had some jewelry boxes of old jewelry from them. with every necklace, ring, earring that i pulled out of the box, i asked my mom if she knew whose it was, where it came from, and the story behind it. she only knew the answers to some of my questions and i was aching for information so i could learn more about my relatives. i remember a couple years ago, i was around my mom when i was reading the book "valley of the dolls." my mom said that was a controversial book when it first came out and that she remembered my grandmother reading the book when she was younger. i loved the thought that 40 or so years ago, my grandmother was reading the same words i was. i think that is one of the main reasons why it is one of my favorite books.

wouldn't that be cool if my grandmother kept a diary when she was 24 years old and i got to read it and get an understanding of what her life was like? that's why i want to write in a journal. i'm happy with my life now and everyday i see or learn something new. i want to have a way to remember what i am thinking today 2, 10, 30 years from now. who knows what life will be like when i'm a grandmother. but i want to remember how life is now and what my thoughts are today and that's why my new year's resolution is to write in a journal for 2007.