I used to keep diaries and journals when I was younger. I enjoy jotting down poems, ramblings, crushes, conversations, screenplays, anything that was relevant to me at the moment. I covet little notebooks with pretty covers, from leather bound to miniature lock and key, just as long as they were pretty.

I had many of these little notebooks. Since whatever was relevant was also spontaneous and sporadic, so these little books were never completely filled and did not have any chronology to the entries. It was always entertaining to open one of them up to try and guess during which period of my life was each random entry made.

Sadly, I was not the only one who found my pretty little notebooks entertaining. My overbearing father apparently snooped through every corner of my room ever so often to read what was inside these notebooks, even the ones with the lock and key because I never locked them....spontaneity simply cannot wait for tiny keys which would break after 5 turns. How did I find out that my dad was a sneak? It was a completely horrifying and humiliating experience. Not the most horrific and humiliating experience, however, because life with my dad was too full of them. He read the one-line declaration of when I was no longer his innocent little girl, went out and bought a pee stick and made my mom test me. He didn't stop there. No, he shoved the phone in my hand and demanded that I call that bastard boy over so he could give him a piece of his mind!

I felt so betrayed by those pretty little things, because my dad did all this immediately the day after I scribbled that declaration with lots of exclamation marks. No one knew! It was between me, my boyfriend, and those pretty pink pages. Since I couldn't destroy my father for the betrayal, I ripped out all the pages instead and dumped them in the school garbage bins (of course I couldn't risk having my snoopy dad sift through the trash cans at home, and I know he would have too!)

Ever since I tearfully trashed my random musings and memories in my school garbage cans, I haven't been able to trust again. I haven't kept a journal or a diary since. The most that I have chronicled my life consisted of short descriptions next to checklists on trips, or summaries of events on our wedding website, and lots of pictures (I always have my camera in my purse). I didn't want to be ridiculed or to have whatever is pertinent to me to be used against me.

But, I miss not being able to record my life and myself. How I wish I had documented my "dark years", my jobs, my relationships, my friendships, my wedding planning. Memories are gratifying, but my brain cannot fully accommodate all my murderous tendencies toward certain bosses, so-called friends, boyfriends, relatives, even myself at one point or another. Or can it store all the trivial things that make me snort out loud when I laugh. So if you happen to read this blog, please know that I am slowly opening up myself to trust again.

Oh, by the way, I didn't throw away all of my diaries. I saved this little gem. And it is the only one that is actually completely filled. I figured its cover would trick my dad into thinking that it belonged to my brother, and not me. In fact, I took it from my brother in the first place :)