Another year has nearly passed away. This seems astonishing to me. It seems that just a few days ago it was last year, if you see what I mean. Why, the 20th century passed and we hardly noticed. And it will not be long before the sun consumes the earth. And not long after that, a few trillion years they say, the universe, which started as a bubble-speck, will stretch into utter and never-ending silence.
But my theme today is not the sad one of how time passes so quickly and is lost forever – it is instead the more pleasant one of writing about one way that many people, ordinary as well as famous, seek to capture the present and preserve some of its passing beauty and amazements for at least a few moments longer in the greater sweep of eternity.
This way is the simple diary. I should think thousands of us at some time or another – for instance, as a new year beckons – have resolved to “keep a diary” – probably as part of some grand and comprehensive plan to organise one’s life better and achieve great things – plans, I am afraid, which very soon run aground on the dangerous shoals of everyday living. If you look back – probably with some embarrassment – at old diaries you may have kept you will find, I think, that January is quite well recorded, but by February the entries are sparser and poor March onwards is a blank.
