When I was home for Christmas break in my freshman year at Fordham I remember reading a Time essay about this guy who kept these lists... books and books of all of these random lists. They were just things he noticed, of no particular value individually, but strung together the lists were fascinating. Words on the back of a truck on the highway. Items in a garage sale. Letters skywritten above. It inspired me and I went out and bought a little notebook to jot down random records, snippets of my life. At first, they were all over the place and like my blog, I had to feel out what I was doing with them. But, also like my blog, every now and then you get a gem, I think, and I managed to say something interesting.
Once, I accidently washed one of these books in a pair of shorts in the laundry. When I first discovered what I had done, I nearly cried. Some of the pages were washed out, but most of the writing survived. That let me to start scanning these pages so they wouldn't be lost. But that was a while ago and it was a clumsy process and I couldn't quite figure out what I was going to do with these scanned pages, so I stopped. Now, I think my blog is actually a very appropriate place for them. So, beginning today, whenever I get a chance, I'm going to scan a few pages from my "little books" and post them. I'll start with the ones I already had done.
I guess, in a sense, these were like little blogs, but I just wasn't tapped into the medium to promote it at the time. Also, some of the stuff was a bit too personal for posting. You can tell if you read my blog that I have a definate line when it comes to posting very personal things, but I think what's written in these little books has passed the statute of limitations, since they're about seven years old.
I'll pick out my own personal highlights. The rest might not always make sense or seem silly. I love the little pool diagram. The most meaningful, though, is my post about Patti. Patti was my high school girlfriend for two years, and we broke up in August right before I went to Fordham (I was a year older). I literally recorded the very moment that I could bear to hear about her with other guys and be reasonable about it... five months later. Now, granted that was just hearing about it... I didn't have to see it, but that was a big thing for me. I have no recollection at all who Mike Melia is, but apparently, I thought she was dating him. That was a big step in the healing process there... red letter day.