Commuting Diaries #4

I spend a lot of my train commute writing in my diary. Until this morning, I had never seen anyone else doing the same.

Sitting across the aisle from me was a man who was in his early 30's. Blue shirt with tie, khakis, gray socks and black dress shoes that were very worn and scuffed. He was writing when I got on the train and he was writing when I got off the train: he wrote straight through for an hour. He filled nine pages, back and front, of an 8x8 hardcover red book.

What is he writing? The curiosity was frustrating. At first I figured he was writing things like I usually do: yesterday I did this, in the future I hope to do these things, today I thought about this and it made me feel that, I remember when I went here and it was great because blahblahblah.

But nine pages? Then I thought, maybe he's going through a divorce or someone just died and he's writing it out. I tried to see if he had a wedding band on but couldn't.

The curiosity became so overwhelming that I started hoping he'd put the diary down beside him and forget it so I could take it and read it. I've never read someone else's personal diary. Someone's completely unfiltered thoughts.

Then I started thinking about just snatching it from his hands as I existed the train. I immediately felt guilty. If someone did that to me, I wouldn't so much mind them reading my personal thoughts because they are just like everyone else's anyway, but I'd mind losing my records. My diary pages are stuffed with news print-outs, cards, notes, pictures and receipts because I'm keeping a thorough history of myself for future reference.