Diary Dilemma

I had a long chat today with my friend Jenny, retired Queen’s professor (urban planning) and Green Party organiser. She was telling me about visiting her mother in a care home in England and how little space her mother has. This prompted her to reconsider the two cardboard boxes full of journals she kept from age 21 to 61. She had thought she would enjoy reading them once she was in her later years (I think she’s 65ish?). Now she thinks she won’t have room for these boxes so she’s going through the diaries and pulling out the good bits.

She said most of the diaries are dross--details of fights with her husband or other ephemera of no interest. She finds the things she most wants to keep are mementos she had stuffed in her journals. For instance she campaigned for Jeremy Corbyn very early in his political career and she has a leaflet from that campaign.

I also have lots of journals and diaries. I suspect they are more dross than anything else. Maybe a project for a quiet year--if that ever happens.
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