Today I checked a new book out of the Bismarck library: The Journals of Joyce Carol Oates. It caught my eye since I’ve done some journaling, and, indeed, this web log is essentially a journal, best described by Ms. Oates herself as "... a place for stray impressions and thoughts of the kind that sift through our heads constantly, like maple leaves giddily blown in the wind..." While this web log was never intended to be a literary masterpiece, I’ve always welcomed any reader who chooses to look at it. Since beginning it over a year ago, I have found it to be a satisfying venture and have received a bit of positive feedback from readers. My writing skills had become very rusty, but these weekly musings give me the forum to improve. At any rate, I went back to some old journal entries I had made to see what ran through my mind at that time.
Today in Mandan it is very cold and windy, and my eye fastened on this entry from January 2, 1973. I was heading back to Dunseith after spending Christmas break at home and got caught in a snowstorm and ran in the ditch south of Alice: "I stepped from the car and was struck by the fierce gale which drove the snow like so many hundred needles searching out the pin cushion that was my exposed face."
I remember being pretty upset at the time I wrote this on September 21, 1982: "Today I dropped Clinton off at the daycare center for the last time. We walked in hand in hand and weren’t received by anybody. A dozen or so kids sat in the television room staring at a black and white picture of some x@&?! and three adults in the room working there had not the time to look or say howdy-do or anything else. So it will be the last time he needs suffer through that torment and intellectual wasteland. At his regular baby-sitter, he bounds up the stairs as carefree and happy as can be, and sometimes doesn’t even bother to say good-bye to me as I depart."
I worked at custom combining in Kansas and Nebraska in 1965 and still retain strong memories of the following entry: "His son had committed suicide. The plan was for him to take over the farm operation from his parents, but burdens too heavy for him to bear had led him to take his own life. Mr. Lake lost his future along with his son’s. His zest for living died there in the ditch with the gunshot. He just went through the motions of putting in a crop and harvesting it. Now the lackluster look in his eyes could be explained. He suffered despair. Another factor compounded his problem. His wife had lost her mind. On one occasion we drove into his yard and saw a once magnificent home needing paint and carpentry repair. The lawn was unkempt and scraggly trees needed trimming. The interior of the house showed some neglect. I felt very sorry for him and what his life had come to."
In a letter dated November 24, 1969 to my folks which Ma saved and gave back to me I have this memory preserved much like a journal entry: "Got the package of lefse today and already ate a couple of pieces — really enjoyed it. The past three weekends I’ve been hunting in these mts. — really enjoyed going out but haven’t gotten anything yet. The 1st weekend we went up north of Dubois. I didn’t see any deer that day but got stuck packing out a quarter of elk that my hunting partner shot the day before. It was really tough going climbing up and down the mt. sides with it on my back but I’m going to get an elk supper out of it tomorrow night for my work. He had a donkey that we were using to pack out the elk with, but she went so slow & could only carry ½ elk at a time. There were 2 elk to carry out so 3 of us each took a quarter."
Well, I’ve gotten interested in my old journals again and guess I’ll revisit more of them in the future. Thanks to Joyce Carol Oates for revving up my curiosity.
