Only minutes ago I settled myself on a comfy chaise lounge on my back deck overlooking the beautiful valley where I live.

I was excited to begin reading “Strange Fits of Passion” by one of my favorite authors, Anita Shreve.

I was only a couple of paragraphs into the story when I was again reminded of how very important the written word is.

I have wanted to do more posts on journal writing and Anita Shreve’s first few pages made me jump right up and come in the house to start constructing a blog post.  This will be short, mainly just an introduction to what will be coming in this series about journal writing.

Why is it important to write in a journal?  Or is it?  I will give a few examples from my life, beginning with my daughter, Kimi, who left home right after high school and moved to Southern California to figure out what she wanted to be when she grew up.  And if you are interested in what she became, just click here and be pleasantly surprised (and no, she is not into genealogy!).

But, back to my post.

At one point in Kimi’s journey, she went through a patch of time where not everything was easy or fun and she had questions.  If you are a parent, you are familiar with those times when your kids have to find out for themselves and make their own decisions.  There wasn’t much I could do, being 10 hours and 700+ miles away, but for some reason I decided to remind her of the good/funny/crazy times of her childhood.  I thought it might ground her and put her mind on something light for a change.

Luckily I had kept a pretty regular journal from the time Kimi was about 8 or 9 years old, so I started reading through those journals and pulling tidbits that involved her.  It was actually pretty fun and served to remind me of those fun times when my girls were in elementary school.

I continued to email her these quotes from my journal, and although she remarked on some of them, I didn’t know if they were helping until a few months later when I received an email thanking me and telling me that being reminded of who and what she was at that age really helped her to come to grips with who and what she was as an adult.  Sadly, her reply didn’t find its way into my journal at the time, but I still remember what she said.

So, there ya go – my first reason for writing in a journal – you never know who may need the words you have written!  And now – back to “Strange Fits of Passion!”