Day: December 17, 2010

Among the things I located in yesterday’s paper sorting was a file folder full of pictures that I once used to decorate the wall of my college dorm room. The walls of the dorm were painted cinder block and we were forbidden to do anything which would damage the paint. In order to make the room feel more welcoming than a jail cell, most of us plastered the walls with posters, clippings, and other cheerful things. I did the same during my first year. My second year of college was transformative for me. I was going through a conscious process of claiming adulthood and defining myself. I did not put just anything amusing on my walls. Instead I carefully sought out images which I felt were truly reflective of who I was. I collected pictures as the months progressed. Some came from magazines or cards. Others were carefully photocopied from books. I hung the pictures carefully, neatly. Then half way through the year I re-hung everything on diagonals creating dynamic angles. Howard had entered my life and completely rearranged the way I pictured my future. My dorm walls echoed my internal insecurity. At the end of the year I took them all down and carefully stowed them in a file folder. I married Howard and became absorbed in creating a communal life with him. He did the same. Our walls were hung with things that reflected us both.

Yesterday I opened the file and carefully flipped through the pictures. A wash of feeling wafted to me from the pages. The images stored echoes of that definitive stage of my life. The room I used to live in came back to me. I remembered the wooden crate I used as an end table, the way my roommate and I rearranged the furniture in a non-standard format that felt more home-like to us. I remember that for the first time I was sharing space with a roommate that I’d deliberately chosen rather than one to whom I had been assigned. We had a lot of fun and some over-stressed arguments, but it was a really good time. The pictures carried all that, and they spoke to me. “Remember. This is who you are. You were this person before you were a mother, a wife, a business manager. You still are this person.”

I have no desire to go back to dorm room days. I like who I am. I like everything I have learned along the way. Besides, a lot of the ground between there and here was really unpleasant to travel. I’d rather not cross it again. But in my heart and mind that dorm room exists and the things that happened there are a part of me. The self-definition I did there is the foundation of who I am now. Looking at the pictures helps me see that I’m at another point of self-definition. With this office reorganization I am going to have a space that is truly mine. I can arrange it and decorate it however I will. And I think I will pull out some of these college pictures and hang them again. The decision carries with it a little bit of fear. It was so joyous to find this pocket of memory. I want to hoard it away so that its power will not dissipate. But on the whole, I think that having a visual reminder on my wall will be good. “This is who you were, and still are.”