Dear Diary 01

I shook my head in disbelief and turned another page. Here, more detailed calendars began; the ones where each month takes the whole page, each day in a margin of its own, so that one can scribble in notes and reminders. Again, May and June of 81 were full, written all over with my awkward, still childish hand, using different colors, from red, blue and black, to green and purple, which at the time were the peak of sophistication for a teenager. Math test; History test; Chemistry test; English and German tests in one day. I wondered how I ever managed to keep my sanity with all this testing forced upon my obviously completely immature brain. 

The rest of the notes were inevitably pertaining to birthdays, a very important event in a young girl’s life, especially her own. Danielle BD – January 23rd; Daria BD – March 9th; Cynthia BD – March 23rd; Bo-Jane BD – October 2nd; Janie BD – October 11th; Zora BD – October 22nd; Tania BD – October 24th and then again 25th. I was obviously not certain when Tania’s birthday was, and to this day I still don’t now. Mom BD – October 26th; Dad BD – December 25th. Surprisingly, there were no notes on when my sisters’ birthdays were. They must have pissed me off enough not to include them with the rest of the gang in my precious book. 

And of course, there was my birthday: Nikkie BD – April 4th. Why I had to mark my own special day like that I cannot explain. It’s just something a teenage girl does. Call it egocentric but I’m almost willing to bet that if you peep into a diary of your little sister, your daughter or even in your own, in case you’ve saved it from a long time ago, theirs or your name would be proudly written in the margin which represented the happy day, probably using one of the cool colors, like green or purple. To my defense, I have also included names of the celebrities of whom I knew shared my birthday: Maya Angelou, Anthony Perkins, Christine Lahti and Muddy Waters. I was always most proud to point out that Miss Angelou was born on the same day as me! Muddy I only knew by name, but have gathered early in life that his music had made him a legend of blues, - or was it jazz? - and therefore decided to include him, too. Again, let’s not forget the teenage egocentricity.

I also wondered over the need to include the ‘BD’ after each name. Even after all these years, having missed some twenty celebrations of each of the people that I had so faithfully marked down, I still know their birthdays by heart. I might not always bother to call or send a card, but I do remember them on their special days. I glanced over August and cringed. Of course I couldn’t have missed Rick Springfield and his BD on the 23rd!

After flicking through the margined calendars – there were only years 81 and 82, obviously book makers were hoping that a girl would either get too bored with that one and buy a new one, or worse still be so productive that she would completely fill it out and would absolutely need another – the part with addresses followed. 

Half a page was devoted to each letter, X, Y and Z sharing the same half. Obviously, there are not too many people in the Italian world with first or last names beginning with those letters. My XYZ box only held one name, address and phone number – Zora. The friend with BD on October 22nd. 

I don’t remember drinking heavily at the tender age of fourteen, but should one browse through my address book, one would be certain that I had a serious problem with departmentalizing. I could tell which names were scribbled in first; they were all written in blue colored pen, each properly sorted by the last name and I must have put a lot of effort and care into my handwriting, as despite looking unaesthetic now, it appears to be somewhat consistent and eligible. 

The next batch was sorted by the first names, handwriting already deteriorating, colors varying. 

After getting tired of orderliness, I just wrote names as they came, filling out the blank spaces that were available, starting in the A box. Dolores Anderson, Cynthia Axelrod, Abigail Matthews, and Aimee Stephenson shared this particular space with Maryanne Pinsky, Laurie Kinnard and Xenia, whom despite the uniqueness of her name and all my best efforts, I cannot recall. 

Personal information packed boxes all the way to and including F, after which only the names from the “first” and “second” batches, when I was still trying to maintain some kind of order were dotting the pages. I nostalgically noted that each name held one or at the most two phone numbers – home and maybe a second home if the person was a victim of divorced parents. No cell phone numbers present; early 80s were blessedly lacking those most convenient, yet annoying little suckers.

The most bizarre thing that I had noticed when skimming over the names of my friends was that they all lived on the same street as me, only one or two doors down, some even in my apartment building, which made careful marking of each address, including zip code completely redundant. I suppose in those tender years I still displayed the ambition for some sort of organized arrangement, which later in life I have never quite achieved. 

Again shaking my head in amazement, I quickly browsed through the address book pages until I came to the notebook part. A bust picture of smiling Rick Springfield, his perfect hair obviously fan blown with a painstaking care, his pearly whites sparkling with an unnatural glow, a trace of eyeliner and soft rouge nearly made me drop the book back in the box and forget about it forever. I remember this particular picture of Rick used to be my favorite.