Pillar of Salt
“And Lot’s wife, of course, was told not to look back where all those people and their homes had been. But she did look back and I love her for that, because it was so human.”
-Kurt Vonnegut
My feet step onto a small carpet of dust as I shuffle through the closet in my old room. Finally, at about 9:30 PM, I find them. I go directly into the living room and announce, “I know exactly how I want to celebrate my birthday. I’m going to read all of my old journals.” My mother looks at me skeptically. “Are you sure you want to do that?” she asks.
The first journal began when I was nine years old and my love of language, especially the written word, is immediately prevalent. At the time I planned to write a book about a girl named Stacey who moves and has adventures. During middle school my friend, Rachel, recommended several novels that I simply devoured. She gave me a small booklet of her poems, which inspired me to write my own.
Regrettably, the first 20 pages of my middle-school journal are filled with nauseating, sing-song verses that I painstakingly typed on a typewriter. Later, in the seventh grade, I went back and scrawled angry, sarcastic comments in the margins of each poem. In both my poetry and my prose I started experimenting with bad similes such as, “your eyes are as soft as a kitten,” and “calling him a teacher is like calling my guinea pig 'Willie Mays.'”
My high school journal is saturated with excerpts from what I was reading. I diligently copied bits of wisdom from Greek tragedies, Shakespeare, Fitzgerald, Wordsworth, Milton and Dickens. I clipped out several poems by E.E. Cummings and tried to imitate his style. This was only a launching pad for my freshman year of college, which was an intellectual skyrocket. While at C.U. – Boulder I feverishly recorded everything I was learning about astronomy, philosophy, linguistics, religion and art. I simply could not soak it up fast enough. I started reading the Bible and some angry feminist literature. Once again I fell in love with the classics – Bronte, Austen – and I started writing a weekly memoir that I sent to my friends using “this new thing called electronic mail.”
Unfortunately, the learning process was somewhat stagnant during my first job out of college, but my writing definitely improved because I was practicing at work every day. My first year of teaching was spent grading essays and plodding through my master’s degree, but at the same time I was forced to re-learn American history in order to put the literature into context for my students. Ultimately, I realized that as long as I continued teaching I would also keep learning – as much as my heart desired.
As with any young woman’s journals, I also spent a great deal of time musing about my perspectives on romance. My first crush was on a boy named Toby when I was in the fifth grade. I spent countless pages explaining how much I hated him, then finally confessed in red ink that I loved him completely. In the back of this journal I’ve tucked away a Valentine that I never sent, probably due to the explicit content and emotional risk that are evident in the inscription: Toby. You’re a good friend. Your friend, Alice.
In the seventh grade I became completely enamored with Tony, one of the richest, most popular boys in our school. He was an eighth-grader and, though I never actually spoke to him, I was convinced that I knew him inside and out. I was completely devastated when he got a girlfriend and I wept bitterly for about 27 pages. Finally, I forgave him and immortalized my love in a poem full of bad similes including the phrase, “you are like a rainbow.”
In high school my tastes improved only slightly. My freshman year I fell for Pat Kennedy, a senior, who was on the wrestling team with my brother. There were several small, 30-second interludes when he actually talked to me. Also, it appears that he came to school drunk on more than one occasion, but that really didn’t enter into my consciousness at the time because I thought he was merely “artistic.” I pined after him on into my sophomore year but finally re-assigned my affections to Jaime Henry, a boy in my band class that I actually interacted with on a regular basis. After weeks of toilsome, sleepless nights I finally worked up the courage to ask him to the Snowball Dance. He politely refused and relegated me to unalterable friend status.
The summer before my junior year of college I started dating J.J., my first and only boyfriend. Our first date was on my 20th birthday and I recorded every nuance of this event as though I were writing an epic screenplay. At the end of the evening we took a drive up to Flagstaff Mountain, sat under the stars, and looked out over the city lights. Neither of us wanted to go home but it was getting late and we were both cold. At one point I turned to him and said, “I wish there was a way we could stay and go at the same time.”
“You can,” he replied. “You have the memory.”
We stayed together for several years. Then one evening he bought me Chinese food and told me he didn’t love me enough to marry me. We remained friends for a while after that, but the friendship often made me blue and kept me tethered to the past. The last time J.J. and I spoke was a little over four years ago when he called to tell me he was engaged. He asked me to throw away his old love letters and move on. I did move on, but I’m glad I kept the letters. When I slowly unfolded them from the pages of my journal, I noticed how truly young we were. I saw it in the little hearts that he drew and the way he misspelled the word “grateful.” And for the first time ever I realized that, whatever he did to hurt me, he did it innocently and without malice.
It took a long time to heal completely but I started feeling hopeful again right away. At 26 there was a brief period when I became convinced that I would remain single forever and there was nothing I could do about it. I started buying flowers for myself. I also took a trip to Ireland and changed careers. Throughout my late twenties I maintained a distant hope for a husband but began to value realism over romance.
The most important insight that I gained from my old journals was the fact that God had been pursuing me much longer than I realized. At nine years old my world was filled with comfort and security. “Our whole family loves each other,” I wrote, “even the pets. I love earth and I love hugs.” My family spent a great deal of time together sledding, jumping in the newly raked leaves, and going to restaurants, plays and movies. When guests stayed at our house my brother slept on my bottom bunk and we laughed ourselves to sleep. Our parents consistently demonstrated their love with words and actions. Albeit unintentional, they taught me about the true nature of God.
The middle school years were what I have now termed “The Dark Ages” when relatives started dying, I was riddled with anxiety, and I kept wishing there was someone out there to listen to me. In high school there was a nagging emptiness I could not fill, but at the same time I kept writing about how everything in the universe seemed connected. Officially, I remained cautiously agnostic. On occasion I would write little prayers to God, but I never really expected them to go anywhere.
College gave me the opportunity to feel and think on my own for the first time. Immediately during my freshman year I began linking nature, music, and my understanding of death to some knowledge of and need for God. I kept referencing the “winds of promise” that seemed to be permeating my life. Once I saw three shooting stars in one night. With what I thought was a purely intellectual approach, I started reading the Bible and attending lectures on religion - namely the “creation/evolution controversy.” I never understood why these two things were at odds. “Why can’t science and faith co-exist?” I wrote.
Though J.J.’s Christianity partly influenced my own decisions at the time, he was also somewhat of a distraction. After college and especially after we broke up I hit a major growth spurt with God. This was partly due to my involvement with youth ministry and my friendship with Sheri, a co-worker who later became my close friend and Christian mentor. Sheri had a faith like granite and an encyclopedic knowledge of the Bible. My journals are filled with emails we exchanged – maps of our journeys through scripture and life.
After I turned 26 two very significant things happened: I became a teacher and my Dad was diagnosed with cancer. Both of these experiences changed me forever. I was forced into a new realm of trust and surrender to God. Despite the hardship, I consistently wrote about the peace and freedom I experienced during this time.
-Kurt Vonnegut
My feet step onto a small carpet of dust as I shuffle through the closet in my old room. Finally, at about 9:30 PM, I find them. I go directly into the living room and announce, “I know exactly how I want to celebrate my birthday. I’m going to read all of my old journals.” My mother looks at me skeptically. “Are you sure you want to do that?” she asks.
The first journal began when I was nine years old and my love of language, especially the written word, is immediately prevalent. At the time I planned to write a book about a girl named Stacey who moves and has adventures. During middle school my friend, Rachel, recommended several novels that I simply devoured. She gave me a small booklet of her poems, which inspired me to write my own.
Regrettably, the first 20 pages of my middle-school journal are filled with nauseating, sing-song verses that I painstakingly typed on a typewriter. Later, in the seventh grade, I went back and scrawled angry, sarcastic comments in the margins of each poem. In both my poetry and my prose I started experimenting with bad similes such as, “your eyes are as soft as a kitten,” and “calling him a teacher is like calling my guinea pig 'Willie Mays.'”
My high school journal is saturated with excerpts from what I was reading. I diligently copied bits of wisdom from Greek tragedies, Shakespeare, Fitzgerald, Wordsworth, Milton and Dickens. I clipped out several poems by E.E. Cummings and tried to imitate his style. This was only a launching pad for my freshman year of college, which was an intellectual skyrocket. While at C.U. – Boulder I feverishly recorded everything I was learning about astronomy, philosophy, linguistics, religion and art. I simply could not soak it up fast enough. I started reading the Bible and some angry feminist literature. Once again I fell in love with the classics – Bronte, Austen – and I started writing a weekly memoir that I sent to my friends using “this new thing called electronic mail.”
Unfortunately, the learning process was somewhat stagnant during my first job out of college, but my writing definitely improved because I was practicing at work every day. My first year of teaching was spent grading essays and plodding through my master’s degree, but at the same time I was forced to re-learn American history in order to put the literature into context for my students. Ultimately, I realized that as long as I continued teaching I would also keep learning – as much as my heart desired.
As with any young woman’s journals, I also spent a great deal of time musing about my perspectives on romance. My first crush was on a boy named Toby when I was in the fifth grade. I spent countless pages explaining how much I hated him, then finally confessed in red ink that I loved him completely. In the back of this journal I’ve tucked away a Valentine that I never sent, probably due to the explicit content and emotional risk that are evident in the inscription: Toby. You’re a good friend. Your friend, Alice.
In the seventh grade I became completely enamored with Tony, one of the richest, most popular boys in our school. He was an eighth-grader and, though I never actually spoke to him, I was convinced that I knew him inside and out. I was completely devastated when he got a girlfriend and I wept bitterly for about 27 pages. Finally, I forgave him and immortalized my love in a poem full of bad similes including the phrase, “you are like a rainbow.”
In high school my tastes improved only slightly. My freshman year I fell for Pat Kennedy, a senior, who was on the wrestling team with my brother. There were several small, 30-second interludes when he actually talked to me. Also, it appears that he came to school drunk on more than one occasion, but that really didn’t enter into my consciousness at the time because I thought he was merely “artistic.” I pined after him on into my sophomore year but finally re-assigned my affections to Jaime Henry, a boy in my band class that I actually interacted with on a regular basis. After weeks of toilsome, sleepless nights I finally worked up the courage to ask him to the Snowball Dance. He politely refused and relegated me to unalterable friend status.
The summer before my junior year of college I started dating J.J., my first and only boyfriend. Our first date was on my 20th birthday and I recorded every nuance of this event as though I were writing an epic screenplay. At the end of the evening we took a drive up to Flagstaff Mountain, sat under the stars, and looked out over the city lights. Neither of us wanted to go home but it was getting late and we were both cold. At one point I turned to him and said, “I wish there was a way we could stay and go at the same time.”
“You can,” he replied. “You have the memory.”
We stayed together for several years. Then one evening he bought me Chinese food and told me he didn’t love me enough to marry me. We remained friends for a while after that, but the friendship often made me blue and kept me tethered to the past. The last time J.J. and I spoke was a little over four years ago when he called to tell me he was engaged. He asked me to throw away his old love letters and move on. I did move on, but I’m glad I kept the letters. When I slowly unfolded them from the pages of my journal, I noticed how truly young we were. I saw it in the little hearts that he drew and the way he misspelled the word “grateful.” And for the first time ever I realized that, whatever he did to hurt me, he did it innocently and without malice.
It took a long time to heal completely but I started feeling hopeful again right away. At 26 there was a brief period when I became convinced that I would remain single forever and there was nothing I could do about it. I started buying flowers for myself. I also took a trip to Ireland and changed careers. Throughout my late twenties I maintained a distant hope for a husband but began to value realism over romance.
The most important insight that I gained from my old journals was the fact that God had been pursuing me much longer than I realized. At nine years old my world was filled with comfort and security. “Our whole family loves each other,” I wrote, “even the pets. I love earth and I love hugs.” My family spent a great deal of time together sledding, jumping in the newly raked leaves, and going to restaurants, plays and movies. When guests stayed at our house my brother slept on my bottom bunk and we laughed ourselves to sleep. Our parents consistently demonstrated their love with words and actions. Albeit unintentional, they taught me about the true nature of God.
The middle school years were what I have now termed “The Dark Ages” when relatives started dying, I was riddled with anxiety, and I kept wishing there was someone out there to listen to me. In high school there was a nagging emptiness I could not fill, but at the same time I kept writing about how everything in the universe seemed connected. Officially, I remained cautiously agnostic. On occasion I would write little prayers to God, but I never really expected them to go anywhere.
College gave me the opportunity to feel and think on my own for the first time. Immediately during my freshman year I began linking nature, music, and my understanding of death to some knowledge of and need for God. I kept referencing the “winds of promise” that seemed to be permeating my life. Once I saw three shooting stars in one night. With what I thought was a purely intellectual approach, I started reading the Bible and attending lectures on religion - namely the “creation/evolution controversy.” I never understood why these two things were at odds. “Why can’t science and faith co-exist?” I wrote.
Though J.J.’s Christianity partly influenced my own decisions at the time, he was also somewhat of a distraction. After college and especially after we broke up I hit a major growth spurt with God. This was partly due to my involvement with youth ministry and my friendship with Sheri, a co-worker who later became my close friend and Christian mentor. Sheri had a faith like granite and an encyclopedic knowledge of the Bible. My journals are filled with emails we exchanged – maps of our journeys through scripture and life.
After I turned 26 two very significant things happened: I became a teacher and my Dad was diagnosed with cancer. Both of these experiences changed me forever. I was forced into a new realm of trust and surrender to God. Despite the hardship, I consistently wrote about the peace and freedom I experienced during this time.
With that same peace resting on my shoulders, I find myself once again at my parents’ house, standing in front of the closet in my old room. I carefully stack each journal inside my chest of memorabilia. I pack away all the big ideas and the small details, knowing all the while that in four days I will turn 30 and it is inevitable. It is also a gift. Slowly, I close the chest and fasten the metal clasps. I start to leave but stop at the door and look back at my old room . . . the tiny twin bed . . . the worn out teddy bear tossed on top of a yellow pillow. I turn out the light. I walk out, and close the door.
posted by Alice | 7:35 PM
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