I found my school-sanctioned 'Writer's Notebook' from 7th grade

What was 12 year old Julie writing about?

I sat down to write today, I came to a blank page and told myself just write. I started to think about why I wanted to start a newsletter, and why I like writing, and thought about times when writing came easy to me. I thought back to a memoir class I took in high school, my days as a blogger post-college, and even to the many drafts I have in substack waiting for final edits and for me to hit that ‘publish’ button. And then I remembered a pink plaid spiral-bound notebook I kept from 2003-2004, from 7th grade. My homeroom teacher had us keep journals, or ‘Writer’s Notebooks’. And then I remembered that I still had this notebook, tucked away in a box that up until a few years ago had been living at my parents’ house.

I just dug this out and spent the past 30 minutes or so pouring through it. I don’t really remember the parameters of the assignment or keeping this journal, but in browsing, it seems we had to write a certain amount of ‘entries’ over a certain period of time. Other than t…