The diary that taught itself to write

I kept the notebook for the wrong reasons. I wanted evidence that I was becoming someone. What I got instead was a pile of unfinished mornings, shopping lists, and the same three complaints copied out in slightly better handwriting.

The surprise, looking back, is not that the pages are messy. The surprise is that the mess has a slope. Early entries announce themselves. Later ones just begin.

A sentence gets better the same way a kitchen does: not by a manifesto, but by putting the knife back in the same place until your hand knows.

If you want a writing practice, keep a book that is allowed to be ugly. Date the page. Do not reread it for at least a season.