For Every Novelist, an Alt

I was never one for diaries. In middle school, I tried keeping one for a while; it soon became a long list of girls I hated. Very quickly my mother found it and read it. She summoned me to her room one afternoon to review it with her. 

“Don’t say hate,” she urged, pointing to the word hate on the page; “say strongly dislike. And you shouldn’t use real names. And don’t write down anything you wouldn’t want everyone to know. Especially if you’re bringing it to school.”