Haiku #32 I Am A Writer

I have a memory from a long time ago when I was assigned to work on a little project at church and for some reason I was asked to help write a section of text.  I was probably only about 12.  But the adult who was supervising was working with us and after I helped, she looked me straight in the eye and told me I was a good writer.

When I was about nine, I got a journal and decided to start writing.  It stuck.  Before I knew it, writing became therapy for me.  All through Jr. High, High School and College, when the emotions were running rampant and I had no idea how to make sense of my world, I wrote everyday in my journal.  It was nothing amazing, but it helped me to process my life.

In some ways, I love going back and reading my past entries. Sometimes it is down right embarrassing to read, but I love seeing where I have been and where I am headed.  It always amazes me how short our memories are and how fast things fall through the cracks.  But reading what has happened, helps me put things in perspective and have faith in what is to come.  It can also upset me if I come across something from the past that brings up negative emotions like fear and sadness.  However, like scars, I have earned my life experiences and the point is to become better from them.

I still write. Writing everyday is awfully hard so sometimes I write later on about what happened, yesterday or even last week.  I love being able to read about the day my husband and I talked marriage for the first time, or the day each of my girls were born, or the day I was first published.  It can be freaky to think other generations will read my journal.  Maybe before I die, I will write an abridged version, basically getting rid of everything from my jr. high days.  But my greatest comfort  is knowing how writing has helped me heal, sort out, and understand myself.

Poetry has always been my solid, creative way to express the mess inside my mind.  Writing in my journal is my process for getting that mess outside of my head so I can think straight again.

This little haiku project is coming to an end tomorrow and all I can say is that forcing myself to think outside of the normal by writing in poetic form  has given me new energy.  I don't care how simple these little poems are.  They may never show up in places for loads of people to read, but they were for me. And doing something just for me is just fine.

Journaling
by Kate Cowan

This shabby, routine day
is roughly written in lines,
the ongoing portrait.