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  "description": "The pocket notebook is a curious object. It is valuable because it is impermanent.",
  "path": "/in-praise-of-pocket-notebooks/",
  "publishedAt": "2025-08-21T21:46:04.000Z",
  "site": "https://mnchrm.co",
  "tags": [
    "Traveler’s Notebook",
    "Buy me a coffee"
  ],
  "textContent": "I’ve long had a fascination with stationery. It might seem like a natural pairing for a writer, but it actually predates when I started to think about myself that way, and instead goes back to my time as a student. Beyond the bounds of taking notes for classes, my love of stationery and my burgeoning interest in literature blossomed into my journaling habit, and grew out from there. I’ve collected dozens of notebooks over the years, in various sizes and intended uses, and left them in various states of half-filled. Most never fulfilled their purpose, except one: the pocket notebook.\n\n> The transcendent is brought into the everyday; the mundane is raised to the level of art.\n\n**The pocket notebook is a curious object.** It is valuable because it is impermanent. You can’t be precious with them—that defeats the purpose. The ideas you record there are precious; the notebook is not. You should keep it on you, likely in a back pocket, exposing it to folds and tears, the weather. Even if it makes it through unscathed, it’s a small, demure object: ideally, you’ll use it up, and need to replace it soon. It’s like that old cliché: strong convictions, loosely held.\n\nThat doesn’t mean it can’t be beautiful. I now prefer a Traveler’s Notebook: a simple, soft, thick piece of leather, where various formats of notebooks can be added with elastic bands. Currently, I have a dot grid paper insert (my preference), and blank paper (with the intent of sketching). That’s another great thing about the pocket notebook: there are no rules for its use. It is always ready to respond to any need you have.\n\nTo those ends, I record anything that comes to mind. Questions, things I’m curious about; things I want to research later; stupid jokes that come to me; snippets of images or lines for stories; grocery lists, things to remember; to-do list items—you get the gist. This is a notebook without a threshold; if you think it, it belongs. I think of it as scratch paper. That’s not to say everything I record in the notebook is _trivial_. In fact, maybe the opposite. I’ve used one to take notes on lectures, online courses, or note down breakthroughs, or ideas that would develop into some of the stories I feel best about now.\n\nBy juxtaposing everything next to one another in a single space, you meet in the middle. The transcendent is brought into the everyday; the mundane is raised to the level of art.\n\n**The pocket notebook is small, but it is also mighty.** It's a chance to bring your ideas into the real world. It is a way to make a promise to yourself. That can be as simple as the commitment to get more olive oil, or it can be a pledge to change your life.\n\nI recently replaced the insert in my notebook, and in doing so, flipped back through all the things I'd logged before. I wanted to make sure there wasn't anything I hadn't yet moved to a more permanent spot. And among the first pages in that old book were the early notes, ideas, and research that precipitated my move around the world.\n\nBut, you say, I already have an item in my pocket that can hold all the notes I’ve had and more, and also look at TikTok. This is true, but also false. A smartphone can do many things, including make notes, but writing something in ink or pencil on paper is a different process than typing something on a phone, just the same way as reading something and listening to it are different.\n\nBeyond that, the notebook’s _inability_ to do all that your phone does is its strength. The smartphone is many things; the pocket notebook is _only_ a cathedral for your thoughts. In quiet moments, it’s a pleasure to open it and flip through my ideas, made physical. In doing so, I find connections I didn't draw before, feel much more connected to the ideas than I do when I just type them into my phone.\n\n**The pocket notebook, like us, is a garden** : it must be tended to become fruitful. If you decide to follow down this path with me, you at first wonder what it is you’re supposed to write in this thing. Especially if you’re not a writer, you might not be used to letting ideas come to you, recording them, and moving through your day. But thought begets thought: once you start to do this, you’ll realize the ideas come more easily, more frequently. Sooner or later, you’ll need a new notebook.\n\n* * *\n\n## Subscribe to Refrakt\n\nA bi-weekly newsletter on curiosity, creativity, and (hopefully!) insight, through the lens of photography, writing, study, art and beauty, and my life.\n\nSubscribe\n\nEmail sent! Check your inbox to complete your signup.\n\nNo spam. Unsubscribe anytime.\n\nBuy me a coffee",
  "title": "In Praise of Pocket Notebooks",
  "updatedAt": "2026-06-02T09:12:58.915Z"
}