The Diary Project: Introduction

Hello everybody!
I have been meaning to start this project for a while, but various graduate school assignments have monopolized my time until now. Finally, after two shots of whiskey and a glass of mediocre Cabernet Sauvignon, I've typed up the entirety of my diary entries from the year 1998, which I began as an 8-year-old and ended as a 9-year-old. I definitely drank neither whiskey nor wine at that age.
(I currently have the tipsy hiccups. It makes it hard to type).

My latest project is what I am calling "The Diary Project."
I started writing in a journal when I was 8 years old. I called it a diary at the time, because I liked that word better than the word "journal"(although since learning that "diary" implied "daily", I have amended my language to calling my work a "journal").  Since starting on January 26th, 1998, I have kept a journal or diary of some sorts, continually, since I was 8 years old, and I have filled up 8 volumes.
Over the course of the next few months, I intend to read through my entire diary. We will see what I find out about myself. If it was worth writing about back then, what can it tell me now?

My life history - scrawled in various colors of pen and pencil.

My excursion into 1998 has brought me something simultaneously startling and comforting. Somehow, my casual 8-year-old promises have come profoundly true. Here's an excerpt from May 22nd, 1998 (almost exactly 16 years ago):

"Tomorrow I’m going to Montaray. Now I take riding lessons. The first horse I rode for the first 3^^lessons, was Babe. Now I ride Rosie. In Montaray, there’s a horse named Prit. He’s nice. He’s reddish with white frome his forehead to his nose. He’s my best friend. I rode Smokey. He did everything right when you told him! He’s sandy colored with a black mane and tail. Don’t worry, I’ll take you to Montaray.

When I wrote this entry, Monterey was a vacation spot for me and my family. I grew up in Sacramento, and my parents and I would often make the 3.5 hour drive to Monterey for the weekend. And of course I worked in some time to visit horses when we were there. 

In 1998, horseback riding was something new that I was just beginning. Every family vacation involved a ride on a horse for me. And today, my horses are dear, dear friends of mine. 

I moved from Sacramento to Monterey 1 year ago, for graduate school. I moved two of my horses to Pebble Beach Equestrian Center, where I had met Prit as a child. I walk regularly by the stall where I met him. It's usually unoccupied. The trails I went on as a child - today, those are my playground when I have the courage. 

That diary I promised to bring with me 16 years ago is here, in my desk drawer, in a little apartment at the corner of Jefferson and Larkin Streets, Monterey, California. That promise was only made for a weekend vacation, and yet it is still true. Dear diary, I have brought to you Monterey with me. 

It's amazing how we can sometimes be true to ourselves without even realizing it. 

Cantering on Babe. My first canter on her made in into my diary on July 1st, 1998.

Cantering to a jump on Tarquin, October 2013. Pebble Beach, CA, where I met Prit and Smokey as a child.