My address book

I was never very good at keeping an address book.  The best I seem to be able to do is a little notebook that began as a proper directory of the names and contact information of the people I loved, but which was gradually stuffed up with messy slips of  pastel-colored paper, post-it note scribbles of some dear friend's phone number or some family member's address.  For our honeymoon, I knew I would want to send postcards, and so I stood in my mother's living room and copied from her large and orderly address book all those names and numbers by hand, address after address on a single sheet of college-ruled paper that is still folded up, yellowing, crumb-infested, and buried somewhere in my purse (I find it every once in awhile and, for some inexplicable reason, feel like it would be best just to fold it right back up and put it right back into the tiny pocket from where it came).

I'm just not sure why I can't keep it together.  Perhaps it really is the dependence on technology.  Address books have gone the way of memorizing telephone numbers in the last few years...why bother when you can find just about anything you need in life's little tech gadgets? (Facebook has everybody!  Just, right there!  Their birthdays included!)  I think it's more that I'm just a scatter brain who's bad at the orderly details of life (and I am). Either way, it's a shame.  My little address book is quite pretty, and there's something romantic about having a complete one that you could just stick in your baggage when you leave for vacation or move, a connection to all the people you love at once that doesn't depend on phone calls or text messages.  Ah well.  I suppose it will continue to be a good little paper weight, colorful and sweet-looking.  And I do still need a few of those little slips of paper stuck in its pages...even if it's not the neatest way to keep things, I always know where they are!