There are many wise and spiritual reasons to journal, but I am delighted that I have left a paper trail if only because it’s such fun to stumble over forgotten happenings.

One of our sons, evidently, came home with hair the color of those food dyes we wouldn’t let him eat. When Chuck and I read that journal entry recently, we couldn’t even remember that one of the kids came home with green hair, let alone which of the kids had done so. It was fun to relive this forgotten event, along with a record of the conversation it sparked: “‘I do not like green hair,’ I say. ‘I do not like it curved in an arc. I do not like it glowing in the dark. I do not like green hair,’ I say.”

“Try it, try it, and you may.”

My quick jottings from the past include a host of other colorful characters we had forgotten about: the toddler who ran down the street in boots, and nothing else; the girl who told me she was going to be a friendly teenager until she changed her mind and decided to be a judge. A young neighbor told me he wanted to be mayor. When I remarked that he would have to work hard in school, he announced, “Then I’ll be a taxi guy instead.” Speaking of taxi guys, my journal also commemorates a cab driver who said, “I’m not an overachiever. I just want to pay off my credit card debt. Actually, I guess that does make me an overachiever.”

Another fun encounter preserved in our archives explained that we expected guests to arrive before we got back in town ourselves, so we stocked our entryway with a house key, a movie, and a note telling our friends where to find the computer, DVD player, and snacks. We ended up arriving before our guests, but the movie and key were gone. There were, however, children on the roof of our garage, where they had lugged our porch furniture, house key, and DVD. We told the children they were welcome to play in our yard, but the roof was off limits. “But, we’ve been here for days,” they protested. I would have forgotten about the squatters on our roof if I hadn’t scribbled it down while chuckling.

Image-bearers startle our days with splashes of glory, if only we can stay awake. The Deaf Mexican children who shine in Chuck’s photo exulted in their newfound power of language. A six-year-old in my class observed, “Even good things become bad things when we want them too much.” Every time I leave a funeral, I think, “Streams of glory shimmered all around that person, but I see men as trees walking.”

“What is man that you are mindful of him,
and the son of man that you care for him?

Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings
and crowned him with glory and honor” (Psalm 8:4-5).