Recordkeeping

I just finished reading The Red Leather Diary yesterday. It was Saturday morning, and I'd woken up later than I wanted to, but I'd gone out drinking the night before and was slightly hungover from an unexpected shot of Cabo Wabo and piano jams going through my head. Instead of starting my day off on the right foot by being productive, I decided to stay in bed just a little longer and nurse the headache I'd acquired overnight.

I found the book to be quite intriguing, and much different than I'd originally expected. The book is about the diary of a 90-some-odd-year-old woman that was found in a Dumpster in New York City by a young reporter who works for the New York Times. For some reason, when I think of old people, I always think of them as being sweet and innocent and naive, as if they've never actually lived their lives and made mistakes like all of us do. I'm not sure why I think this way; it's as if I equate them with small children or something. Anyway, it was with this mindset that I read the book.

Boy, was I wrong. People got crazy back then just like they do now! I don't know why I figured otherwise. I guess it's just this perception that people were more conservative back in the day. After reading this book, I'm not so sure that's true!

The book highlighted five years of this woman's life, whose name is Florence, as she grew up in the late 1920s/early 1930s. She was raised by immigrant parents in New York's most affluent social scene during this time. She was exposed to the best education and culture that money could buy, and oddity during the Great Depression. It seems to me that during those times, people experienced life at a much younger age than they do now. At 14 years old, this girl was roaming the streets of New York by herself, going to museums and plays and art shows. These days, we don't even trust a 14-year-old to cross the street by themselves, nevermind roam the streets of a large city. It was a very good read; I highly recommend it to anyone who is curious about life during the Depression in the United States, particularly from a wealthy person's point of view. We read so much about how the Depression affected the poor, almost forgetting that wealthy people still existed during this time.

The book also made me wonder about what life must've been like for my mother when she was growing up. Unfortunately, I never got to the point where I got to know my mother and what her life was like before I born. I've always been curious about her life before me. Was she like me in any way? What did she dream about? What were her regrets, if any? What were her hobbies? I wish I knew. Wish there were a diary I could find of hers that would fill me in on everything I never got to discover about her. I feel like the more I know about her, the more I will know about myself. Hopefully one day, I will find out.