New Year New Notebook

by Miriam Halahmy

Christmas is over and in four days time the New Year will begin. I won’t be in London, we are flying off tomorrow to visit my husband’s family in Israel. So today is a packing day and there is one thing which will be at the top of my list. A new notebook.

My husband has discovered that a brand new notebook is always a thrill to me as a writer and so with great relief, he happily wanders around museum shops, Paperchase and backstreet stationers, choosing me new notebooks on a regular basis. He buys me the sort of notebooks I would probably never indulge in for myself.

He has learnt some basic no-nos along the way. I hate most lined paper, I’m so particular about the width of lines that he almost never ventures into lines anymore. And I can’t stand paper with bits of wood in them, you know, those arty crafty papers which are absolutely no use to man or beast.

But I love good quality cream paper, I like a nice hard cover with a picture on the front and I absolutely love the deep pockets that most modern hard cover notebooks have these days slotted neatly into the inside cover.

So what will I be writing in my new notebook? I always keep a journal when I  travel. Its nice to have a quiet place to lose myself in, especially as I will be in the middle of my husband’s very large and entertaining family. They are Iraqi Jews and he and his seven brothers and sisters were born in Baghdad. The family went into exile in Israel in 1950 along with almost the entire community. The Iraqi government turned against its Jewish community after the creation of the State of Israel and almost a million Jews across the Middle East were forced out of their homes, losing everything they owned.

 Many of my husband’s family still live in Israel. But a sister is coming from Australia and a brother from New York and so it will be a bit of a reunion. And then there are all the children, grandchildren, cousins, their children…. need I go on?

Israel is always a fascinating and challenging country to visit and so I will be bombarded with a huge range of experiences. How will I cope without my notebook to process everything?

And also, as always, a new idea for a book is brewing and so in the end I might find myself packing two notebooks, to keep my book idea separate from my travel experiences. Its is going to be a busy week and the New Year has not even arrived.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE/HAPPY READING/HAPPY WRITING