I just woke up after the last sleep in the first bedroom I actually remember. This will always be my room. Slanted ceilings and built-in dressers and shelves creating super cute nooks. My grandpa built those shelves. They held not only my books-Kindergarten Letter Books, scholastic book fair books, The Boxcar Children, Judy Blume, Louisa May Alcott, VC Andrews, Stephen King all held space here before English Lit teachers began introducing new pages to turn- but also my rock collection, my Loves Baby Soft, glass animal collection, my art supplies, sports trophies, jewelry boxes, albums, cassette tapes, my boom box and dried flowers from school dances. It seems like my whole life has been stashed on those shelves.
The walls are painted the palest cloud gray now and I’m struggling to remember it’s previous personalities. I think there may have been wallpaper with little turtles on it??? The the dresser drawers were painted alternately blue and green. This would have lived with the blue and green shag carpet and the hallway’s bold, diagonal stripes of blue, green and yellow. I’m talking azure, chartreuse and sunshine-Mama didn’t play with pastels. Oh and there were big painted flowers… that hallway was trippy. I hope there are pictures somewhere.
I remember this room with our old twin poster beds with matching dressers and desk and nightstand. I remember moving the beds into the nooks- so much room for activities. And I remember moving them back to flank the window not long after because they blocked the heat register. I’m so familiar with the tings and crackles of that floorboard register- they pinged and plucked out a lullaby for me last night and welcomed me into today. Winters were so cold in this room. We had thick, itchy wool blankets between our sheets and bedspreads. I could, and did, melt my handprints into the frost/ice on the inside of the big, old window. New windows helped. It’s weird how a house gets newer as it gets older.
I used to have an old black and white tv in here. I watched Trapper John and Quincy and played pong. I had a dial radio tuned to WLS so I could listen to Boogie Check with John Records Landecker. WLS…The Loop…WXRT. All of me grew up in this room.
We three sisters shared and fought over a long corded rotary phone that reached into our bedrooms. I can picture junior-high-me, feathered hair, black eyeliner, jeans and t-shirts and adidas shoes; marathon calls with silly boys and watching tv shows with someone on the other end, just laughing and talking during commercials or quiet late night conversations until I fell asleep with the phone still pressed against my face. High school me and college me look basically the same although I switched to brown or plum eyeliner and the boy wasn’t so silly. Oh how I wish I still had that phone.
