Joan Didion’s Journal
@joandidionsjournal.bsky.social
When we talk about mortality we are talking about our children
May 19, 2025 at 2:21 AM
When we talk about mortality we are talking about our children
We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forget who we were.
May 12, 2025 at 12:44 AM
We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forget who we were.
Life changes in the instant. The ordinary instant.
April 23, 2025 at 9:19 PM
Life changes in the instant. The ordinary instant.
Keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether, lonely and resistant rearranges of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiment of loss.
March 8, 2025 at 7:41 PM
Keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether, lonely and resistant rearranges of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiment of loss.
I did not always think he was right nor did he always think I was right but we were each the person the other trusted.
March 6, 2025 at 1:26 AM
I did not always think he was right nor did he always think I was right but we were each the person the other trusted.
The fancy that extraterrestrial life is by definition of a higher order than our own is one that soothes all children, and many writers.
February 7, 2025 at 2:05 PM
The fancy that extraterrestrial life is by definition of a higher order than our own is one that soothes all children, and many writers.
A single person is missing for you, and the whole world is empty.
February 4, 2025 at 3:07 PM
A single person is missing for you, and the whole world is empty.
It is a good idea, then, to keep in touch, and I suppose that keeping in touch is what notebooks are all about. And we are all on our own when it comes to keeping those lines open to ourselves: your notebook will never help me, nor mine you.
January 29, 2025 at 8:07 PM
It is a good idea, then, to keep in touch, and I suppose that keeping in touch is what notebooks are all about. And we are all on our own when it comes to keeping those lines open to ourselves: your notebook will never help me, nor mine you.
I know what the fear is.
The fear is not for what is lost.
What is lost is already in the wall.
What is lost is already behind the locked doors.
The fear is for what is still to be lost.
The fear is not for what is lost.
What is lost is already in the wall.
What is lost is already behind the locked doors.
The fear is for what is still to be lost.
January 15, 2025 at 12:09 AM
I know what the fear is.
The fear is not for what is lost.
What is lost is already in the wall.
What is lost is already behind the locked doors.
The fear is for what is still to be lost.
The fear is not for what is lost.
What is lost is already in the wall.
What is lost is already behind the locked doors.
The fear is for what is still to be lost.
I closed the box and put it in a closet. There is no real way to deal with everything we lose.
January 9, 2025 at 7:56 PM
I closed the box and put it in a closet. There is no real way to deal with everything we lose.
In theory momentos serve to bring back the moment. In fact they serve only to make clear how inadequately I appreciated the moment when it was here.
January 4, 2025 at 8:41 PM
In theory momentos serve to bring back the moment. In fact they serve only to make clear how inadequately I appreciated the moment when it was here.
I write entirely to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.
#literary
#literary
December 28, 2024 at 9:47 PM
I write entirely to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.
#literary
#literary
We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forget who we were.
December 21, 2024 at 7:49 PM
We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forget who we were.
The impulse to write things down is a particularly compulsive one, inexplicable to those who do not share it, useful only accidentally, only secondarily in the way that any compulsion tries to justify itself.
December 20, 2024 at 6:33 PM
The impulse to write things down is a particularly compulsive one, inexplicable to those who do not share it, useful only accidentally, only secondarily in the way that any compulsion tries to justify itself.
In time of trouble, I had been trained since childhood, read, learn, work it up, go to the literature. Information was control.
December 17, 2024 at 12:23 AM
In time of trouble, I had been trained since childhood, read, learn, work it up, go to the literature. Information was control.
I have trouble maintaining the basic notion that keeping promises matters in a world where everything I was taught seems beside the point. The point itself is increasingly obscure.
December 5, 2024 at 8:55 PM
I have trouble maintaining the basic notion that keeping promises matters in a world where everything I was taught seems beside the point. The point itself is increasingly obscure.
We are imperfect mortal beings, aware of that mortality even as we push it away, failed by our very complication, so wired that when we mourn our losses we also mourn, for better or for worse, ourselves. As we were. As we are no longer. As we will one day not be at all.
#literary
#literary
November 30, 2024 at 1:00 AM
We are imperfect mortal beings, aware of that mortality even as we push it away, failed by our very complication, so wired that when we mourn our losses we also mourn, for better or for worse, ourselves. As we were. As we are no longer. As we will one day not be at all.
#literary
#literary
Joan with Quintana, in their house on Franklin Avenue.
November 28, 2024 at 5:11 PM
Joan with Quintana, in their house on Franklin Avenue.
Joan Didion visiting Alcatraz prison
November 27, 2024 at 2:30 AM
Joan Didion visiting Alcatraz prison