THE DEATH OF author Sue Townsend has saddened many former teenage diarists today.
The Diary of Adrian Mole inspired loads of young people to pick up a notebook and pen and begin pouring out the details of their lives on the pages.
As a teenager your diary was essential, but you’d die of mortification if anybody read it – even now. Because what you wrote in there is just too embarrassing for words.
Pages of rants about parents
According to your diary, you had a terribly difficult childhood. You hated your parents. They never let you do anything. The phrase “I wish I’d never been born” was thrown around a bit.
With age comes wisdom, and also the realisation that your parents were OK, actually.
Detailed accounts of fights with friends
Rebecca is so annoying. She bought the same scrunchie as me ON PURPOSE even though she knew I had it first. She’s always copying me.
Why are teenagers so mean? If any of your friends ever knew what you were writing about them in your diary, you’d be socially ostracised for the rest of your life.
Deep analysis of romantic encounters
Very few things were too boring to be written about in your diary. Hot Gary asking to look in to your book in Maths meant three to four pages of “WHAT DOES IT MEAN?” later on that evening.
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The particulars of your first kiss were also painstakingly catalogued, with every moment accounted for.
Little did you know that in the future you would prefer to forget it completely.
Pocket money budgeting
It was important to keep track, since you were saving to buy the newest Now That’s What I Call Music CD.
So when you remembered, you did some basic bookkeeping in the back of your notebook.
£5 pocket money
£2 for piggy bank
Tuesday – 60p on sweets
Wednesday – 20p on chocolate bar
£2.20 left until Saturday
Lists
Lists were an integral part of any teenager’s diary. There were lists of people you’d kissed, lists of people you wanted to kiss, rankings of the boys/girls in your class, or rankings of the most attractive celebrities.
Very important work. Definitely a better way to spend your time than doing homework.
Heartfelt odes to celebrities
Maybe it was a pop star or an actor or someone off the telly – we all had one celebrity that we obsessed over to the point that our diaries were used to plan weddings, or imagine first meetings.
Of course, now you wouldn’t want anyone knowing you once were mad for Dec of Ant’n'Dec.
Cringey song lyrics
They might have been your own failed attempts at songwriting or the most ‘meaningful’ lyrics from your favourite band.
Either way, it sends a shudder down your spine to remember what you thought was deep and profound in those days.
Terrible slang
You picked this up from reading magazines and thought it made you sound cool.
As if you would ever say “fit” or “lush” in real life.
Treating your diary like a person
Blame reading The Diary of Anne Frank for this. Naming it, asking it questions, saying sorry for not writing for so long.
Good god, it was a NOTEBOOK. What were you thinking?!
