I’ve been a life long journal, or diary as they were called growing up, keeper from the day I was given a Mickey Mouse diary as a gift from a friend of the family when I was maybe about 10 or 11-years-old. It had a fancy lock clasp and keys to hold all the “secrets” or my most private of thoughts from prying eyes. At least whatever my kid brain thought was well worth keeping tucked away for just me.

The habit of journaling stuck, and it has tracked every stage of my life from adolescence to young adult to now. A book shelf is filled with completed journals of thoughts and memories that mattered most to me at the time. Recently, I decided to take one of those books off the shelf and began thumbing through the pages. What I found within those pages was a girl who was and wasn’t me.