Unity Center
 2041 Old Fanning Bridge Road, Mills River NC  28759
(828) 891-8700, 684-3798
Email: unity(at)unitync.net

A Room of One's Own

In 2002, we took our daughter Lyric to UNC Chapel Hill to begin her college career. When I got home, I undertook a major cleaning of her bedroom as a way to keep my tears at bay. Many women I know couldn’t wait to remodel their children’s bedrooms once they went to college. I kept Lyric’s space sacred for her visits home, always wanting to make sure she knew that it was waiting for her return. Stuffed animals crowded the dormer window and queen bed, ready for her to squeeze in beside them upon her return. Unused clothes, photographs and tons of schoolwork remained in dresser drawers as I was unable discard anything, not knowing what was important for her stored memories.

From UNC, she went to NYC and then DC where she has been living on her own for three years in an efficiency aptly called the doll house. The name honored Ibsen’s play, the tiny space, and her wonderful decorative ability to transform a flat into a beautiful miniature home.

Last Christmas when Lyric was home for the holidays, I asked her to weed her belongings, making stacks of what she wanted to save so I could store it in the attic. I would disperse the rest and redecorate, giving myself an office to write in without interruption. The request was met with silence. I wondered if she felt pushed from the nest.

The day before she left to return north, she tore through her room like a whirlwind, filling many bags with “trash” for the dump, and others with clothes and toys for recycling through Helping Hands. She saved very little. The room was bare of her personality, and I found it almost unbearable to enter. I began searching the re-cycle bags, second-guessing some of her discards and saving them to add to the other treasures I had gathered over the years and placed in the attic. My feeling was that someday she might have a child of her own, and would regret discarding her special dolls and animals. I had found my doll collection in my mother’s garage in California on a visit home when I was thirty-nine. It was so exciting to bring it home to the Virgin Islands, and give the dolls to my daughter. They are now part of my attic’s booty.

Our house resembles a log cabin, wood inside and out. I began a remodel of the room in spring. I painted two wood walls a warm yellow, envisioning the golden glow of a winter sun forging a snuggly refuge. I hand-painted carved crown molding and door trims with gold swirls and ivy leaves. Two wood walls remained, one of which I covered with bookshelves to display favorite tomes, photos, and knickknacks.

I began collecting books for my retirement reading, books for those days when I just want to curl up in a sunny room and not have to leave the cocoon of home. These compliment the two shelves filled with past favorite “new Age” non-fiction that I look forward to re-reading. I brought down our photograph albums from the attic and arranged them chronologically, year-by-forty-years of our life together. From California to the Virgin Islands to North Carolina, a pictorial history of our experiences is at my fingertips.

Within days of my arranging the albums, a niece in Idaho wondered on Facebook when was the last time she had seen her cousin who lives in Utah. They were raised in California, where my brothers and I grew up. My family, over a few generations, has crossed the United States from east to west and back again. Distance has kept the cousins from ever really knowing each other. Now the Internet has become a meeting place.

When I saw the post, I thought California would have been their last connection. I found a photo of them, their last together, taken when the youngest was seven. I scanned it and posted it, proud to share a family memory.

Paintings collected on our travels embellish my golden walls, and a spring green quilt covers the bed, beckoning sweet dreams for the weary. A massive red oak, framed in the north window, hosts squirrels that chatter in its branches. The afternoon sun fills the dormer in glowing welcome. A desk sits waiting patiently for me to capture in retirement the stories of our life, and the joy it has been in its creation.

As I approach this winter season, I am drawn to the final chapter of my life and how best to express it. I want to share in the beauty of this place, our journey to be who we are and how we got here. But this will be more than a room of my own. It will be an inviting retreat for Lyric when she graces us with her presence. That will always be our greatest joy.