As the matriarch of the family, I decided that each member of our family needed to be keeping a journal more regularly (at all, really). So, as a shot in the arm, I brought a smattering of my personal journals from years past to the dinner table. I hadn't read any of them in years, so when I began reading excerpts from my junior high journal, I nearly fell into fits of laughter. And then, as I relived each painful adolescent moment, I was nearly moved to tears. Pubescence is a curse! Why must we all endure such treachery!
Painful accounts of who my latest "crush" was in love with instead of me, tragic tales of who had snubbed me. Doleful droning about daunting homework assignments. The lists of who my friends were, and the touching reminder that they were the same as they are today. Wrenching rants about acne trouble, weight gain, and braces.
The insecurity and overwhelming self-consciousness seem to literally drip from the pages of my seventh grade journal. Oh the agony! And I say all of this realizing that I was a fairly normal and well-adjusted youth. I would still consider my adolescent years a relative success. I can't begin to imagine the torture of those who are still traumatized by their teenage-hood. I still maintain that I might lock my daughters in their rooms for the junior high years. Then, miraculously, they might emerge as beautiful butterflies.
But, perhaps, there is a real lesson at the heart of all of this. There must needs be opposition in all things. We can't appreciate security and confidence without knowing the intensity of the opposite. We will never truly relish love and celebrate happiness without knowing heartbreak and sadness.
Thank goodness for junior high journals. I am now reaffirmed in my commitment to making my children keep journals and in keeping my own more faithfully. Then, years from now, I will look back on today with the same sense of irony and appreciation.
