My Room

A task assigned to me in The Artist's Way, a workshop for unblocking your natural creativity, by Julia Cameron:
Describe your childhood room. If you wish, you may sketch this room. What was your favorite thing about it? What's your favorite thing about your room right now? Nothing? Well, get something you like in there--maybe something from that old childhood room. My childhood room was very large, probably about 14 feet square with 10 foot walls. It nearly echoed. It was a corner room in an old farmhouse built in the early 1900's, with two windows on the west wall and one facing north. My father had built a storage unit all across the west wall, which included a closet in each corner, a low six-drawer component under each window, and a vanity and mirror with two small side drawers in the center. The wood floor was almost covered with a linoleum with a light brown and blonde background and a geometric pattern that included some red and green. (At first I was trying to remember a similar floor with a floral pattern, but I think that was somewhere else, as each of the nine rooms and three bathrooms of the house had a different one.) The walls and ceiling had been textured but never painted. The head of the big double bed was opposite the mirror and windows, centered on the east wall right next to the door. At bedtime I could just barely leap from the hallway to the bed and hide under the covers, holding my breath for a long count, thus foiling the under-the-bed monsters. Apparently this was only necessary in winter when dark came early, the linoleum was freezing cold, and the blankets were thick and heavy.

My favorite thing about it? I guess simply that it was mine. In late spring and early fall, I liked the north window opening to the cool side of the house, shaded both by the two-story structure and by tall elm trees along the edge of the property. I liked the vanity, with an old embroidered dresser cloth, and interesting little knick-knacky things I had collected, some bought wih my own money from my little red velvet purse, which Granddad refilled with change from his pocket. I have no summertime memories, because we were never there in the summer.

What do I like about my room now? Ah, I like it because it is, or feels, large. After too many years of living in a teeny-tiny house, I crave space, and my new small house was designed with an open plan to satisfy that need above all. My room has two big walls for pictures or mirrors, mostly created from photos of my own. It has the perfect combination of quieting darkness in the sleeping area and energizing light coming from the bright open living area which has windows all around. My favorite thing about my room is the small nook created accidentally between the curtained closet and the laundry room, where my corner desk fits perfectly just under the one window. Right angle to the window, a short wall now holds an interesting poster, but may later display a pretty painting and/or some small shelves for paperbacks and knick-knacks.