Is this the end of my paper journal?
Embracing digital journaling for a more creative, clutter-free future.
For my tenth birthday, my godmother gifted me a 1-year hardcover diary with a lock and key. The notebook, white with a pink paisley motif, sits in a box just under my desk, along with the 70 notebooks that followed. Another dozen, from the recent past, sits on a shelf, within reach. The current volume is #83. In February 2023 — over a year ago — I cracked it open and numbered the odd pages, as I always do, from 1 to 159. As of June 2024, barely half the pages have been inked. It’s not that I stopped journaling. My train of thought just moved to the clouds.
The bulk of the past
In 2005, I moved across the country for grad school. At the time, it was to be temporary, so my boxes of journals stayed in a closet at my parents’ home. After marrying my Vancouver-born husband and settling on the West Coast, it became clear that moving back to Montreal wouldn’t happen.
Keeping a long-distance relationship with my past was comfortable for a decade, but when my now-widowed mother planned to let go of the family home, I knew it was time to revisit the arrangement. I wasn’t interested in having someone else deal with my baggage, so on one of my summer visits, I found myself sprawled on the floor with over 50 journals towering around…