Originally Posted by
gneiss 
And now I think I'm going to take the journal out and hold a little book barbecue. It's the journal all my drug use is recorded in, and not only do I not want it laying around where anyone could pick it up, but I don't want to read it again. It hurt to read it, brought up all that negativity. It's not like I'm likely to forget the lessons I learned, so unless I'm feeling masochistic I have no reason to keep it. Adios, Past. Good riddance to you.
I haven't actually done this yet, haven't had time. And now I'm having mixed feelings about burning it. I still don't want it for the reasons I mentioned but on the other hand I feel like I'm throwing away a huge part of my life. I read the war stories my grandfather wrote out before he died and even though he certainly didn't want to remember all of those things (like walking into a concentration camp to liberate all the skeletal half-dead people inside) they influenced the course of his life.
Or reading the journals of some relative of mine (can't remember how I'm related to her) that record, as a young child, her trip across the country in a covered wagon. During this time she learned to read and write and the only fee was for her to promise to write in a journal every day. She kept her promise and as an old woman, just before she died, she wrote about her first airplane ride across the country, and the first moon landing. That's an amazing life. Not that mine will be anywhere nearly that awesome; these people conquered insurmountable odds. I just smoked dope.
Maybe I'll write a summary in the next journal, explain why that volume is missing (I have quite a collection, been journaling since I was 12 or 13) and why I didn't want it around, and move on. Reading the old journal just makes me upset and every time I see the wretched thing I open it.
I don't even know why this is worth posting... but here are my random babblings for your amusement.
