222 JOURNALS. DOCUMENTED.

Paper Trail

Because I am a regimented, ordered, organised, unchaotic creative, I began a project two years ago to document the journals I have created over the past 8 years.

I wanted to recycle the ones that no longer made me happy, and the way I usually do that with sentimental things is to photograph it before throwing it away.

I’d also seen a few people number their journals and it would make me sad that I had never done that. I decided to start from zero at the time, ignore any journals I had already thrown/given away, and just count those on my bookshelf. There were 284.

Two years later and my number is at 359.

I’m proud of that number. Not because it’s large or small or anything other than just a number. It’s a number greater than zero and greater than zero means that I put myself out there on the page more than nothing. THAT is what speaks volumes to me.

Have I been fervently documenting, tabling, and photographing every journal I’ve created since tracking? No 😂. But again. More than zero.

Looking at these journals is like a self-portrait over time, for me. I can remember exactly who I was at the time. I can feel what I was feeling at the time. I’m taken right back. I can see my growth, my struggles, my personal unfolding.