Who is XXX???

We've all got a little voyeur going on in there ~ we read blogs.
Whatever you choose to call it. Online diary. Online journal. Log. Record. Ranting. Rambling. Whatever. It's a diary. It's an open book.

For the writer, there's great satisfaction being read by anyone at all.
For the reader, well, there's something decadent about being able to enter someone else's life and reading all about it and yet having the option to remain anonymous.
We read and get to learn something about someone else and sometimes, we go, hey, I'm a little like that too but I didn't know someone else was feeling the same way.

But what of the humble hand written diary?
I stumbled upon a little black book yesterday afternoon.
Lazy Sunday afternoon. The writer having his siesta. The writer's wife unpacking boxes in their room from their recent house move.

It was a simple daily appointment diary book; those which your insurance agent gives you annually.
I opened it. I read it. (well, it was not under lock and key what right?)
A couple of old cinema tickets fall out.
His grandfather's newspaper obituary clipping falls out.
I see a love note in my writing inside.

You would think with 25 years and two kids separating the entries and now, I would not bat an eyelid.
But all the time, I was squinting at the pencil marks, my mouth in an open grin, my heart racing, I wondered, when it said 'tried to call you', 'met you today', 'miss you' ~ was it referring to 'me'?
The diary had my name all over it.

Then I read it. A simple sentence. Four little words. Not my name.
The entry is written tinier and lighter than usual. As though it wasn't meant for anyone to understand, just in case it fell into the wrong hands (muahahaha!!!)

Although it no longer matters, it probably would have mattered back then. Everything could have been different.
A lump gets stuck in my throat.

The writer wakes up and is horrified that his kids too have read the entry and are wagging their fingers at him, going, 'Ooorrrr!!!Who is XXX???'
He tears up the diary and throws it away.

Moral of the story:
stick to online diaries which people actually want you to read!

Remember the song, 'The Diary' by 'Bread'? (70s pop/rock group and nothing to do with your breakfast) You can go to Youtube and find some people playing or singing the tune if you need to know the song. Nice, sad tune.
Poor chap or perhaps lucky that he found out at all....

The Diary ~ by Bread

"I found her diary underneath a tree
And started reading about me.
The words she’d written took me by surprise
You’d never read them in her eyes.
They said that she had found the love she waited for.
Wouldn’t you know it, she wouldn’t show it.

When she, confronted with the writing there,
Simply pretended not to care.
I passed it off as just in keeping with
Her total disconcerting air
And though she tried to hide
The love that she denied,
Wouldnt you know it,
she wouldnt show it.

And as I go through my life,
I will give to her my wife
All the sweet things that I can find.

I found her diary underneath a tree.
And started reading about me.
The words began to stick and tears to flow.
Her meaning now was clear to see.
The love she'd waited for was someone else not me
Wouldn’t you know it, she wouldn’t show it.

And as I go through my life,
I will wish for her his wife
All the sweet things that she can find
All the sweet things they can find"

So he holds me at night and tells me I'm the best thing that has ever happened to him.
He says I'm crazy because he can't remember writing all that stuff.
I believe him.
But I still feel a bit weird.