Room-Cleaning Gems.

Cleaning out one's room--along with dental appointments and eye exams and errands that have been on the to-do list for months--is one of the special joys of being home from college for a long visit.

You leave the room clean, of course, when you go away to your cute apartment. You may pop in at home every couple of months, pulling items out of the closet to grab a favorite hat to take back, piling last semester's textbooks on the desk, throwing all the things that aren't quite treasure but aren't quite trash into a heap in the corner because you can't decide what to do with them. And then one day you drag home a suitcase and throw it open for a week-and-a-half visit, clothes spilling out haphazardly as somehow the objects occupying the room multiply until you hit the low point: having to carve a path from the door to the bed.

And then you hunker down, and you clean.

That's where I was today. I was itching to clean up the mess, to sort out the piles and to...well, dive headfirst into my childhood.

I've lived in the same room since I was four years old. Despite all the cleaning out and weeding through of it, that room contains my history, and there are always treasures to be found. Every once in a while I get the urge to, not only clean off the floor and clear off the surfaces, but open the cupboards and drawers and begin pulling things out. Each time I embark into a cleaning frenzy, I am able to let go of more things than I could the last time: glittery butterfly clips, broken sea shells I don't remember, spiral notebooks from high school chemistry. And each time, I discover treasures: usually ordinary items, shoved into the drawer years ago, that remind me of who I am.

Today I was reminded of two aspects of my being:

1. I have always loved to write, and...
2. I had a unique downright strange sense of creativity.

Exhibit A.
One summer, I decided to create my own code. I believe I was ten or eleven, and I think it started on a car trip from Utah to Vegas. I gave each letter a symbol and made a chart for it, just like normal kids do when they create a code to write secret messages to their friends.

But then I memorized it. I practiced it so much that I didn't need to look at the chart to know the symbol for each letter. And I could read it. And then I filled a binder with pages of stories written exclusively in my special code.

feel free to use it for all your secret note needs.... it's a pretty sweet code.

binder-ful of stories

more pages

even more pages

The bad news is: I can no longer read this and am way too lazy to decode pages and pages of the stories I wrote. In addition, I am now concerned that I was a more abnormal child than I could have ever imagined.
The good news: If the US Government needs a code to relay secret messages in a time of war, I totes got them covered.

I think I have always been a writer at heart (although usually not in code... thank goodness). When I was in kindergarten or first grade, my mom bought me a little black and white composition notebook, and I filled it with stories: about a bunny who didn't like carrots, a girl who didn't like being the middle child (hmmm), and a girl with a dog named Cookie. As I got older, the tales became much more dramatic, and usually typed on the computer. Most every story included orphans, kidnappings, princesses... and often several elements of a movie I had just watched. (oops) I had plans to be published and famous after writing the next great.... children's chapter book.

Today I discovered the beginning of what could have been a masterpiece. It is entitled, "Anna's Adventure" and by the looks of the handwriting, I think I was about twelve.

Chapter One.

Anna was a fun-loving, brave, and spunky girl. So when her father announced he was going to a remote African jungle to collect scientific research, she begged to go. The next thing she knew, she was in a jeep escaping an angry pride of lions. She wondered what she had gotten herself into.

Chapter Two.

"You sleep in the higher hammock. You'll have a better chance of survival," Anna's dad said. They had arrived at their jungle hut finally after they got away from the lions. Anna looked around. Yuck. It was dirty, smelly, hot and mosquito infested. She felt a sting on her leg and looked down. "Dad!" She called, "I was stung by a beetle."
He ran in, then gasped. "It's poisonous!" he yelled. But it was too late. She fell to the floor with a thud.

Chapter Three.

"She's alive!" her dad shrieked. Anna sat up and looked around. She was in a big hut, surrounded by African tribal leaders. "Anna, these people saved your life." She met Chief Poko and the others, then she and her dad left the hut. On the way out, she collided with an American boy her age. "Anna, this is Matt. He helped me carry you here." Anna blushed and smiled. She had found a friend.

Dang. I'm super bummed it ended there. But c'mon. Chased by African lions and stung by a poisonous beetle and saved by a hot American boy all in one PAGE?? This could have been like a safari-themed Twilight.