Do you keep a diary?

I have a small one in my handbag and have had one for 30 or so years. They are kept in a cupboard at home and come in very useful for checking when things happened.

Thoughts and feelings are not recorded in them so I wouldn't really care if anyone read them although I would expect someone to ask first - if I was still alive!

10 things to be grateful for each day! That is quite a tall order isn't it? Do they have to be new things?
A lovely idea SaraC

You are right, my DB found the whole process very liberating. He was a baby when our dad died and got to know him through the diaries as a human being rather than the demi-god he had been told about. A few of DF friends and people mentioned in the diaries were still alive and he made contact with some of them who filled out the stories too. They are all gone now.
I think my point is, you can't know what the future holds but if someone , someday gets comfort from reading your words, it's better not to throw them away. We are grateful that DM kept the diaries. despite not wanting us to read them for years.

Gramaretto - what a wonderful way for your brother to get to know his Father. I kept a diary in my teen years for about three years (my Mother threw them away...) but a dear friend gave me a five year diary a few years back which I have kept. It’s extraordinary, after even this short period of time, to re-read how life has changed for me. I will definitely get another when this runs out. I’ve also made a New Year’s resolution to keep a Gratitude Diary, writing ten things I’m grateful for each day. So far, so good and it’s a lovely time for reflection ...

Kiwigramz you must be very young. My memory is deteriorating rapidly. My DC send us a calendar each year which has all the birthdays plotted (and photos of the DGC on each month) so all I have to do is remember to look at it. We have a very large family - at least that's my excuse.

I don’t keep a diary. I try to remember all appointments and birthdays and have only ever been caught out once. I really do it to keep my memory ticking over lol.

My family think I am mad and maybe they are right

My dad wrote a diary which was more like a journa. It was in a hardback book. His writing was minute and almost in code. He underlined initials of people he met. He met many people. He kept it from the age of 23 until he died 18 years later. All the years were condensed into about 6 books. Now it has been transcribed by my DB it is fascinating. to me His university years, friends and girlfriends, meeting my mother, introducing her to his parents, the war years, job, family, travel. I wish I had done something similar.

My Dh and I have joint online diary for appointments but I do not write down my musings.

My dad used to write down places on holiday, where they ate and what they ate. He also wrote what he spent each year and what on. I have these diaries from 72 years of marriage.

Since the mid 80s I’ve kept a regular diary; for the last 15 years or so it’s been a five year diary. I write in it every night when I go to bed and look back at what I was doing in other years. I enjoy reading funny things that family and friends have said and done,for example, but some events are heart breaking to recall.
My diaries are useful for checking when things happened too. DD1 and I were reminiscing about a spa day we spent together. She thought it was 3 years ago but was actually 5. It’s so easy to lose track.

I record each day’s musings in A5 hardback notebooks, so might write two pages or two lines. I couldn’t be constrained by a page a day or a five year diary. Each book lasts between six months and a year.
Does anyone else remember Arietty’s diary and giant pencil in The Borrowers? Most days she wrote, “Mother cross”.

I started keeping a diary before I was 16 but gave up a few years later. Resumed again, probably in my early 20s, gave up, but have been keeping one every day for probably about 40 years plus. Not sure where they all are. Still write one up every night. I buy an A4 page a day and it lasts me for about 5 years. I started a new one in Jan 2019 so tonight I shall write up today on 14 February 2019 but changing the day to Friday and the year to 2020. So every night I can look back and see what I was doing on 14 Feb last year. Was interesting when I got to the end of the one I'd bought in 2013 and that lasted until end of 2018. I could see what I'd been doing on that day for the last 5 years. Always written with a fountain pen.

At the back is a list of the books I've read with the date I finished them. When I finished the 2013-2018 diary I photocopied the books page and pasted it into the new diary.

Also - the diaries came from W H Smith. The 2013 cost £12.99 - and so did the 2019 diary.

I tend to keep file notes of the important stuff; if I have to phone tax office for example, I date and time my notes, record who I spoke to, what main points were raised and the outcome. I then file that in the relevant folder. Appointments are in my personal diary, on my phone with a reminder alert set and on the house calendar.

Do I keep a diary? I'm on my 3rd five-year diary and have over 30 filled A5 spiral notebooks (journals). I feel much better for writing things down. Not sure if I want them read after I pass on, but I can't bring myself to throw all that hard work away!

I have been keeping a 5 word a day diary since the beginning of the year. It's working well - eg Sudden Visual Dust Revelation (on the day I had a cataract op!)

There is good research evidence that writing even a couple of lines a day help stave off depression and anxiety. I have kept a diary before in difficult circumstances, and it did help. However, I started a nightly journal since commencement of chemo in Sept 2017. Initially, it was to record medications and symptoms, but I added brief details of food, exercise, weather, significant news and a few lines about daily events. Since I finished treatment, I have kept up my nightly writings and, as the medical aspect has shrunk, I have increased the daily jottings. I use the Day One app which works across my devices, and to which you can easily add photos etc. I would say that it is immensely useful. It helps to keep one objective and records the context in which one writes.

I have kept a diary since I was 16 which was 1963 and keep them in shoe boxes for each decade at the bottom of the wardrobe.. Just a few lines on each day but handy to look up events and holidays etc. Its also fascinating to compare early days with my babies and children compared to how my daughter and DIL behaves with theirs Very different! I also love to see what I was doing this time last year so keep last 3 years to hand.

I don't keep a daily diary but over a period of a few years I wrote down conversations with my mother as she was gaslighting me and I had trouble with doubting my own memory and perception x

Ok Grammaretto, you win. I will let you know when I get my Damehood for services tomundane musings.?

I’ve always kept a diary and couldn’t manage without it ! 5 GC to look after at various times, weekends away at my 2 sons places, appointments for 90 year old Mum, shows and nights out with friends etc I’d be totally lost without it and don’t even like the on line calendar either !

I like to have a diary to carry in my handbag, and I use it purely for bring stuff relating to my diabetes (blood pressure readings etc) these days. As a younger person, I used to write in a diary all the time, and when alone or worried (I'm twice widowed) I did find that writing my thoughts down helped to sort them out, and worry less. It was a way of getting things "out of my head" by putting them on to paper. It is useful if you don't have someone close, in whom you can confide. When working, my diary was essential for appointments. These days, everything is written on to a wall calendar, kept in the hall, by the telephone table (and yes, there is still a telephone on it, even though hubby and I have personal mobile phones).

Thanks for that reference Vintagegirl1950, it is the same one I was talking about. ... too lazy to look it up! Bishopsgate Institute in London.

I also keep a separate 'diary' for garden ... it has 5 yr for each page. Nice to look back over and check when something was planted or when first in flower.

I have an appointments/events diary. At the end of each year, when I'm replacing, I flick through and record any specific dates or events in a log book and then dispose of the defunct diary. Often say, if anyone grabs my bag, keep the cash but please give me my diary. Totally scuppered without it on a day to day basis.

I kept diaries when I was a teenager and my first husband found them and read them. Well the end result was he was so jealous that he ripped them to shreds and binned the lot! I have never kept a diary since but I wish I had after I got divorced from him. They would have made interesting reading. Fortunately I do have a good memory for date, especially anniversaries and birthday.

vintage1950 thanks. I will definitely take a look at that.

If you are wondering whether to get rid of your old diaries, you might consider sending them to the Great Diary Project. This is a sort of national archive and accepts transcripts, copies and engagement diaries. I have many decades' worth of diaries and don't want them to be destroyed after I've gone. The website is: thegreatdiaryproject.co.uk
Chronicles of everyday events might seem dull to us but could be a rich harvest to future historians.

Never kept a diary wouldn't have wanted any one to find it but kept a few personal letter's until recently when I stood, in tears , watching them reduced to ashes amongst some garden waste I was disposing of.