December 21, 1698

I woke up today like any other day. I woke up to a chilly morning, still thinking about my husband who died three years ago. He owned this printing shop, I took over the shop as the printer and my sister as the bookbinder. I walked down the stairs to my printing press, I saw my sister Charlotte Godfrey sitting in her usual chair water marbling a piece of paper. Water marbling is a technique my husband taught Charlotte a while ago. I don’t know much about it since I’m not the bookbinder, but I’m pretty sure it’s where Charlotte drops a little watercolor inside a tray and swirls it around with a special tool. After that she dips the paper in the swirled color and leaves it to dry. The technique is used for bookbinding because leather is quite expensive and marbled paper is cheaper. My sister and I are both middle-class women, I’m 28 and my sister is 22. My daughter is 12 and my son is 8. I guess I think about the same things everyday, my daughter, my son, my sister, my deceased husband and my job. My husband George Cyrus, died of malaria. I didn’t know he was dying, I was out of town with both of my children and my sister, doing some work. When I got back home there was a doctor waiting. He said he was sorry, he said that George died. I didn’t know what to say, I was shocked. I left town for a week and all the sudden George dies. I don’t like to talk about it now, but I think of George’s death constantly. I miss him a lot, and without him, supporting the family is much harder. Anyways, printing is a moderately stable job, I make enough money to support all of us. I make about 15 shillings a week, which is a lot in some cases. But if I type anything offensive, to anyone at all. My license can be taken away. My family and I are always at risk. If I lose my job then we will have no money. All our money comes from my printing job, my family depends on me. My children are both well educated, I taught both of them how to read and write when they were both very young. My sister hasn’t found a love and I’m starting to wonder when she will. After my husband died both of my children were devastated. I grab my apron of its shelf, and slip it on. The apron is almost completely black from all the ink now. I start to print some extra copies of the Virginia Gazette, I pull the lever, push the paper, pull the lever, push the paper. Over and over again, my life is quite repetitive and I would like more excitement. Some people say that my life is great, they wish they were me, they say I can express my feelings in what I write. But I can’t. They don’t realize that if someone takes offense to what I write, my entire family is at risk. I write what I am told, I write what is sent to me. All I do is arrange type, ink them, and pull a bar. For the entire day. I wish that my life had more excitement, my husband was still here. But I don’t at the same time. My job is stable, and I have enough money to support all of us, the last thing I would want is my family going into poverty.