| | "As my sons have grown and begun shifting through the gears of their early adult years there are long stretches of time in which we are out of communication. A few years ago I instituted the "Father-Son Journal Exchange" wherein my sons chronicle their lives, loves, hopes, fears and frustrations throughout the year. I, in turn, keep a journal for each of them, trying to impart wisdom, anecdotes and any lasting fatherly advice that happens to strike me in the moment.
And we do all this in Moleskine journals of various kinds. Then, on January 1st of each new year, we exchange the journals and receive new, blank ones in return and start the process a new.
The journals have been heart-rending at times, as I am allowed inside the most intimate and fierce struggles of each of my sons. But I wouldn't trade those sometimes dark times for any amount of money. These journals are now priceless time slices.
"This is a picture of this year's journals. Throughout the year they chronicle their lives -- which are varied and scattered everywhere from the open road of a long-haul trucker to a missionary in Nicaragua to a Navy Corpsman -- for me; their thoughts, hurts, wounds (physical, emotional and spiritual) all go into the journal. For my part, I try and impart whatever fatherly wisdom I can at the moment along with allowing them to peek into my hopes, dreams, desperations and foibles. We trade journals on New Year's Day, handing over spent and well-worn companions for promise of a empty pages." - Brock Meeks, Annandale, VA
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