The wrapping was exquisite: a small package in shimmering paper tied with a beautiful bright pink bow. In it were the blank pages of my journey from pre-teen to adolescence and the anticipation of the adventures that would fill them. The purple cover was smooth and padded with a picture of a pair of pink ballet slippers propped up against a white box and a white rose placed delicately across the toes. It was the perfect 4x6 inch diary with a page representing each day for the next five years, and the best part was the gold lock on the right edge to which only I would hold the key. In the beginning, the lock was sufficient. After all, what great secrets could an eleven year old really have? At some point, the conglomeration of my reflections became too intimate to risk their exposure and the lock was not adequate protection; I started hiding my gift.
A small ledge inside a framed hole in the wall above my bed, which served as an access panel to our home’s main water valve, proved to be my ideal hiding place. Each night I would reach into the wall and carefully retrieve my diary, grab the key from under my keepsake box, unlock it and recount the day’s events. I would then dutifully return my diary to its sacred spot. One night, I lost it.
In following my nightly ritual, I had just finished writing the most confidential page of my teenaged life – something I would never share with anyone. The account was so furtive I considered ripping the page out and destroying it, but I resisted the urge. Instead, when I replaced my diary, I took great care to push it back as deeply into the wall as possible - to the point that I could barely reach it. The next morning, I decided that the page should be removed, and as I grasped for my diary I knocked it off of the ledge, losing it into the wall. Despite my best efforts I was never able to retrieve it.
Many times throughout my adult life I have returned to the wall and have attempted, in vain, to reclaim my lost adolescence. I now realize that there are some things I cannot have back; my youth is one of them. Though the memories remain, they were not meant to be relived or undone.
Carried away with nostalgia, I endeavor to recall what was written in that diary. What was my first entry? What did I write about my first kiss, first love or first anything? So many firsts occurred in that stretch of 4 ½ years. I know that I bared my soul in that book, and I would like to know who I was in those years. I am certain that the girl on the verge of womanhood would like to meet the woman she has become.
Misplaced behind that wall are not only some of my darkest secrets, but also a few of my greatest triumphs. In it I wrote my sorrows and fears, as well as my hopes and dreams. That padded purple book contains the litany of my adolescent experience. Yet, because of one outrageous moment, my gift and all its contents are buried behind a wall.
Reminiscing on my hidden diary, I am thoughtful of the walls that I have erected in my life: walls to protect secrets, hide fears, vanquish hurt and bury guilt - - walls of shame. What else is hidden in my self-made labyrinth? Is it possible that by pushing negative things out of my mind I not only conceal them, but also repress the gifts life has given me?
Sometimes I imagine my diary being found, and the events leading to its discovery. Maybe the house will be renovated and the walls will be torn down. Perhaps the day will come when the house is demolished and the diary is found amidst a pile of rubble. Who knows? I recognize that many of my buried treasures can only be discovered by letting go of those things that have hidden them, and I alone am responsible for removing my own walls. Forgiveness is both cleansing and revealing. It allows a person to rip out the painful pages of guilt and regret, and illuminates the soul.
The Christmas before my sixteenth birthday was five days after the distressful diary event. Under the tree was another perfect package, but this one was different. It was a journal, not a diary. The journal was bigger with more lines for writing, and the unlabeled pages encouraged freedom to write at my whim. The cover was cloth with a funky paisley print and a two inch strip of leather running down the spine. I was particularly fond of the thin purple ribbon that was attached to the binding to be used as a bookmark. The most noticeable difference was the absence of a lock.