Friday, November 20, 2009

My Old Tyme Diary Entry


My daughter made this in preschool years ago but we still hang it up.  It says "I am thankful for milk".

A type of book I love to read are old diaries.  I just got one from the library yesterday.  It's fun to get a glimpse of life in the "olden days".  Have you ever read a diary from the 1800s or early 1900s?  They usually are not like what you would expect a diary to be - they usually aren't full of long entries talking about their most secret feelings.  Usually each entry is only a few lines long - usually stuff like, "Good weather today.  Brought in three sleds of wood.  T. Jones brought the mail by.  Had dinner with the Ellsworth's in the PM."  It seems that keeping a diary was a popular thing to do, as there are so many that have been published.  I wonder if there was some purpose for documenting their daily activities, other than for fun?

I was thinking what if today I kept a diary in a similar style?  On the one hand, seems like the entries would generally be so mundane (unless I was going on a Myrtle beach golf vacation or something), but I guess the old-time diaries were pretty mundane too, although today they seem quite interesting (to me anyway).

The most recent diary I checked out from the library is of an unmarried young woman, and she notes in nearly every entry the dress she wore, LOL.

Well, here would be my "old tyme" style diary entry for yesterday:

"Weather drizzly.  Caught up on some phone calls and emails in the AM.  Made mashed turnip for the first time and put in freezer for Thanksgiving.  Had leftovers for dinner.  Took daughter to 4H.  Watched Survivor and The Office."

In a couple of lines, what would your "old tyme" diary entry look like for yesterday or today?

The end.
Posted by none other than Carole K at 8:26 AM
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5 comments:

  1. I have my grandfathers diaries and all the entries are like the ones you highlighted. Pretty boring stuff considering we were not allowed to read them until both my grandparents had passed away. I was hoping for some gossip but there was none.

    Mine would read something like:

    Checked emails, wrote a post, read other blogs, fed the animals and kids some leftover which no one appreciated. Still wearing sweats from Monday. Need to get oil changed in both cars.

    Thankfully we have blogs now so we can say so much more.
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  2. I still hang hand made ornaments on the Christmas tree too. I even have a few that I had made as a child.
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  3. I like your journal entry. It actually says quite a bit. :) And, I am really interested in the title of the book/diary that you are reading about the young girl and her daily dresses.

    And I did try to write a journal entry - but it just sounded too stupid. lol
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  4. Daughter woke me up very early, and son was up shortly afterward. Son feeling well after getting adenoids removed. Had a time in the afternoon he was uncomfortable, but improved after pain meds. Husband stayed home from work to help with kids and I cleaned the kitchen from top to bottom. Husband picked up the toys in the living room. Kids promptly dumped them everywhere immediately afterwards. I wanted pancakes for dinner and husband wanted burgers and sweet potato fries, so we had pancakes and sweet potato fries...very healthy. Played games after kids went to bed. Good day.
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  5. @ Sheila - the diaries I got from the library are "A Year in the Life" - it's a 1915 dialy journal of Edward Dean, an Amenia Union farmer, by Julian Strauss and, "My Grandmother's Diary" The Daily Life of a 19th Century Woman by Geraldine Gilchrest Savoury. And you should have written your entry - it could hardly have been any stupider than the rest our ours! LOL! :-)
    ReplyDelete

I read each and every comment, and though I don't always get a chance to respond, I enjoy reading (and pondering) what you have to say. Thanks for your 2 cents! :-)

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