“Are you like, using that notebook for meditation purposes?” This question. I’ve heard this question countless times. Some people asked because they were curious of what I wrote, while others asked because they had been noticing a different behaviour in me. A different vibe, a different aura. My temper and my anger issues had been ruining my relationships, and that notebook seemed to be fixing it. I guess I was using that stupid journal for meditation purposes, before I burned it. The whole point of it was to write down all my issues and secrets and feelings that had been eating me alive, so I could feel relieved. It worked perfectly for the first month. People grew more curious about it, while I grew to be more calm and collected. I wouldn’t let anyone read it, of course. I thought that no one would bear to read it because of how disturbing and melancholic it was, but at the end of it all even I couldn’t bear to read it. Although, I remember how it started.

It was May 18th. I had to iron my clothes so I went down to my basement. I noticed a notebook thrown in a bag at the corner, so I picked it up. I stared at it for a long time until I came up with the idea of writing in it. Which didn’t seem that groundbreaking at the time. At first, I wasn’t clear of what I was going to write, but I still grabbed that notebook because I had a feeling that I needed it. As the days passed the only function that the notebook had was being thrown in my closet until dust devoured it whole. I got reminded by it again after my mom found it, as she was cleaning my room. The next day I got in a fight with her. It wasn’t just like any other fights we had, this one was different. I remember her vividly saying, “What happened to you recently? Do you need to talk? Are you hiding anything? Why do you need to make other people’s lives harder because you can’t bear your own insecurities and secrets?” which was ironic, because my mother didn’t realise that she had the same issues as me. All irony aside, that fight made me realise what I was gonna write about. I wrote down everything that bothered me, every thought that I had. That notebook was me. It was me in paper form. Eventually, I started writing daily, and I’m glad to say that it worked for a while. I became a better person - at least temporarily. Like a cloud that finally let go of the rain inside it. But sooner or later the cloud would fade, and I would change, and so would the things that I wrote. And they did. The wording I used became more angry, the thoughts I had became more disturbing. I wrote about my sleep deprivation and my appetite issue. I wrote about my scars, I wrote about the issues within the family. I wrote about my grandpa, and I wrote about my brother. I wrote about my depressed friends, and I wrote about the people in my life who had left me. I wrote about self harm and I wrote about everything that was rotting in my brain. But the last thing I wrote was, “I’m tired.”

I was very tired. I was so exhausted, in fact, that I couldn’t pick up the pen and keep on writing those thoughts, so I didn’t finish the notebook. I felt too selfish, too self-centered and pathetic writing myself all the time, especially since the things I wrote weren’t benefiting me anymore. I woke up one morning, August 18th, went to the local store, bought an energy drink and a lot of matches, and burned my notebook. The whole thing, I burned it. It was relieving and it felt good. No, actually, it felt amazing - to let go of all of it. It was such a beautiful lie, to tell myself that burning my notes would permanently get rid of my negativity, and even though I knew that it was all delusion, I still burned that notebook to ashes. I told my mother about it and obviously she didn’t agree. She wanted me to “save my works”, so I could read them when I was older, even though she didn’t know what I had written in it.

She said, “You know Lea, someday you’re just gonna have to settle in, mature, and be reminded of what you were when you were younger.”

So I said, “Mami, that’s why I burned it.”