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I hand write reminders to myself to do this and that. Sometimes they look like they must have been done by someone else, and I haven't a clue what their scrawl is about.
My handwriting isn't the greatest. I take notes when I'm on phone calls and often can't figure them out afterwards. For me, a sheet of 8 1/2 x 11 paper is often "write-only memory".
I've kept a journal since 1989 and write in it as often as I want- sometimes daily for a spell, and other times, a couple of times a week. Typically I write 3 or more pages at a whack, all written longhand with a fountain pen. The last time I bothered to estimate, I've written well over a million words, and I'm working on Journal # 61. All are spiral bound notebooks, college lines, and 180 or 200 pages each.
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I keep a handy little notebook with my shoe sizes in different brands, lists of books to read, favorite quotations, and all sorts of miscellaneous information that I want to keep all in one place. I enjoy handwriting and prefer a non ballpoint pen.
Both of the above describe me. I find creativity flows much better when I write by hand, and use different colors, depending on my mood. I've tried so many different "to-do" apps on my phone, but prefer to keep a handwritten list and also a hard copy calendar/date planner.
However people don't appreciate it, they want email.
I appreciate a hand written sympathy card, or Christmas card, or thank you note. I get a number of the latter hand delivered to me in connection with my volunteer work.
However, in most situations email is preferable. It is faster and easier on multiple levels. I don't know how people function in life without email, unless they are semi-recluses. One example: I am coordinating a family reunion among ten cousins in their 60's and 70's who live in Virginia, Georgia, Mississippi, Arkansas, Louisiana, and California. In addition there is our one surviving aunt in her early 90's who lives in Alabama. With one click I can address an email to the other nine cousins at once. It would be a nightmare to have to make nine phone calls or to address nine paper envelopes, stamp them, and get them into the U.S. Mail. I do have to call my aunt, who is without email, but at her age I certainly don't feel any resentment about it.
One 73-year-old friend, with whom I used to enjoy communicating with about books, movies, and other topics, stopped doing email about a year ago. I consider it a major rudeness, and I do resent it. There had been a group of three or four of us interested in the same kind of movies and books, so again, there would be group emails. No more, and so sad. The friend who stopped doing email lives about 22 miles from me, so although we still get together in person and still talk on the phone (just as before), there is still a large whole. She wants pictures of my grand niece; my sister emailed me a video, and I had to impose on her husband to show it to her in his email - that was O.K., but he will get tired of that sort of thing if I do it too often. Email is one of the fantastic conveniences of modern life.
I had a hard time at first. I began my first journal shortly after New Year's Day, 1990, made 2 entries, and then put it aside for over a full month. . . .
Mostly, however, those who read usually say something like "I had forgotten I did that!" or "Now I remember what happened!"
Its' all good. I will probably continue to write to the end of my life. Its a very rewarding activity.
Thanks for this inspirational post! You found a way to make journalling work for you.
Yes. Havent in a few but, in my one year in Iraq we had no internet and we had to pay international rates for phone calls so I wrote everything in letters home. No USO but AT&T set up phone tents that took phone cards. I had a class of 3rd graders as pen pals and I wrote home to mom, dad, and my wife. The wife got 3 letters a week from me for the entire year. Only 3 of them were less then 4 pages double sided. Most were in the range of 8 and 9 and I think the longest one I wrote was 11 pages both sides.
You sound like me. My dad used to tell me that he had to read my letters in chapters, they were so long. When my ex was a firefighter he would be gone six months every year with visits home being rare so I wrote to him every single day and mailed cards/letters every three days or so. He brought them all home with him and I still have them. Ten years worth! lol I kept all of his to me too. People have asked me why and it's not because of any emotional attachment but rather a very long 'diary' of life back then. I wish my mom had kept all my letters from when the kids were little and growing up.
When I was a kid I loved practicing my penmanship. It probably helped that my parents were always so full of compliments about my handwriting and made me try even harder. I can remember sitting for an hour or so just making all those loops and stuff on my practice paper. I think I considered it 'art' or something.
I hand write only if I must. My handwriting is dreadful and has always been. When I travel, I keep a journal and that is handwritten since I bring no electronics.
I'm afraid that the only thing I consistently write in cursive is my signature on a check While I was still working in the accounting field, I did a lot of tax returns by hand which involved printing, not cursive, so I got in the habit of printing. One of my daughter's teachers made a comment about my printing that my daughter overheard (think she was meant to over hear) that most people who printed instead of using cursive were illiterate
I make LOTS of notes while online. I have a container full of pens and scrap paper next to me all the time. So notes, shopping lists, 'to do' lists and my occasional check, are all I really write anymore. My ex printed everything or, sometimes, half and half. He was VERY intelligent and anything but illiterate.
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