Not to mention, memory—just like homes—is architectural, and there are many doors (pun intended) through which to enter a story.

I just finished teaching a nonfiction workshop at Columbia, and I've been thinking how so many of us are isolated from family and friends. In these moments, it's good to remind ourselves of the familiar in the midst of unprecedented times. Not to mention, memory—just like homes—is architectural, and there are many doors (pun intended) through which to enter a story.

– Morgan Jerkins

Prompt:

Think about a memory attached to a specific room in your childhood home. Write about the feelings and/or lessons you extracted from it that anchor you even in the present day.

Alicia Di Scipio

Location: Santa Monica, CA
About: This piece was a part of the three day series about home, places and memory. This happened right before I left LA where I'd been quarantining for 3 months to go home to Boulder, Colorado for the first time in a while. I have an interesting relationship with my home and my town. This prompt opened up some much needed reflection on that relationship.
Age: 25

I Have A Problem

I have this problem. My problem is that whenever I think of my childhood bedroom upstairs over the dining room of my parents’ home on Skyland Drive in Niwot, Colorado, the room with a windowsill that overlooks the whole backyard, I see myself under the sheets uncontrollably crying, covering my mouth and trying but failing to calm my breathing to stop my family from hearing while they laugh and sing James Taylor while a chicken cooks in the oven. Whenever I think of my childhood bedroom with the white desk in the corner that has never been used except to hug picture frames, a lamp that doesn’t even hold a bulb, with a metal trashcan between its legs, I think of Thanksgiving Day 2012.

Whenever I think of my childhood room, the one that I painted with my mom in grade school, when we stood for hours with a small stamp, dipping it lightly in purple paint and delicately pushing it against the plain walls, pulling my small hands away to reveal a petite flower. We repeated this all afternoon until the four bland walls resembled one of my Grandmother’s gardens in New Hampshire.

Whenever I think of the room, I think of my mother entering, most likely not prepared to see her 17 year old daughter hyperventilating and curled up in a ball. Whenever I think of my childhood bedroom on Thanksgiving Day in 2012, I think of my mom telling me she hated the person I had chosen to spend the last three years with. I remember she said that he took me away from her. I was a senior in 2012. I’d be moving out in a handful of months. I remember she said she hated him for ruining her time with me as she walked out of my childhood room. Whenever I think of my childhood room, I remember my soaked pillowcases. I always had strong sinuses. I remember rubbing my eyes and sitting up. When I cleared my nose, I could smell the garlic sautéing in olive oil in the kitchen below. My sister was starting the mashed potatoes without me. When I popped my ears, I could hear James Taylor sing “Christmas future is far away, Christmas past is past.” My family was signing “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas” without me.

Whenever I think of my childhood bedroom, with the trunk at the foot of my bed, with the door that never had a working lock when I was growing up, that would slyly open wide if the lightest breeze gave it the confidence to do so, I think about how my eyes welled up like a dam and my stomach dropped in the bad way and I got the tightness in my thumb, the one I only get before singing or speaking in front of large groups of people. But this was because of a text. Nothing along the lines of “I’m thankful for you.” More along the lines of, “I’m staying over here today, have a good day.” I remember crying before I knew it was over, but I didn’t want to admit it to myself. I wouldn’t know until years later that “when you outgrow a lover, the whole world knows but you.” Where was Lorde when I was talking myself out of a panic attack while my three siblings and two parents made stuffing and apple crisp and roasted Brussel sprouts a floor below.

Whenever I think of my childhood bedroom, I think of everything I missed while my salty eyes soaked my sheets and my skin sweat under the duvet. I think of all the days I missed before that and how I didn’t want to miss anymore. I have a problem. My problem is that whenever I think of my childhood bedroom, above the dining room , the one with the Waterford chandelier that dangled above the large wooden table, responsible for the no dancing or jumping around rule enforced by my mother, I think of how much less time I spend curled up in my sheets. I’m too busy singing James Taylor and peeling potatoes while my dad types away on his laptop. “I’m almost done, I promise”. My mom floats around the room refilling everyone’s Champagne glasses. My older sister dances in the middle of the kitchen with our dog in her arms. My younger brother is telling the jokes responsible for all the giggles. My oldest sister adds more brown sugar to the top of the skinless green apples. I have a problem. It’s only 3pm on Thanksgiving Day and I’m already full.

Anonymous

I’m thinking about my childhood bedroom. The furniture is rearranged, and there’s a queen sized bed now, although I had a twin growing up. But the curtains and the color of the paint on the wall are still the same.

I can’t remember what led this particular incident to happen. In fact, I’m not even positive that it really did. But I’m pretty sure. Pretty pretty sure. There are two other major events in my life that I remembered a certain way for years, but came to doubt myself on — the afternoon that my high school aged boyfriend raped me, and the emergency C-section that allowed me to deliver my first baby. Some years later, when I was brave enough to re-read my journal entries about those times, I found that I had remembered almost everything correctly.

So I think this really happened. I think I trust myself enough to believe it.

What I remember is racing up the stairs, my heart pounding out of my chest. Could I will my legs to pump fast enough to outrun him? I ran into my room and slammed the door shut, fingers shaking as I struggled to turn the small lock in the doorknob to keep him from getting in.

I crossed to the farthest corner of the room, diagonal from the door, staring out the window at nothing.

“Open this door right now!” he shouted as he grabbed the handle and shook the door with a force that scared me. “Open up or I’ll take this door off its hinges!”

My father is a large man. He’s over six feet tall with a wide frame and enough bulk that I never doubted whether he could break the door if he wanted to.

I can picture him even now, baring his clenched teeth at me like a wild animal.

Many years later, my husband and I had a couple of couches delivered. It was a set that included both a sleeper sofa and a loveseat, shipped across the country to our small New York apartment as hand-me-downs from my father-in-law and his wife in their Bay Area home.

We had measured the width of the doorway, but apparently not precisely enough. The movers tried a few times to get the first couch in, taking the feet off the base. But they had other deliveries to make and couldn’t stick around to help much longer. We lived on the second floor. They had hauled the burdensome sofabed up the flight of stairs, but left the loveseat in the lobby for us to deal with on our own.

“We’ll have to take the door off its hinges to fit these in,” my husband said. “I’m going to need some help.”

We called a nearby friend and begged him to come over. It was in the 90s that day and we were sweating as we wondered what to do if the couches wouldn’t fit through.

The door was heavy. Removing it involved a screwdriver and took at least half an hour. All three of us worked together to lever it out of its hinges and into the hall.

I realized then, well over a decade later, that it had been an empty threat. He couldn’t have done it if he wanted to — not least because I’d have had to open the door in order for him to access the hinge.

But in that moment, I only knew he was shaking the door so forcefully, and hollering so loudly, that I was overcome with a wave of fear. What would happen to me if I refused? But then, what would happen if I let him in?

Slowly, I crossed the room and turned the lock in the door.

Eline Versluys

Location: Dakar, Senegal
About: I am a mom of 2 girls, living in Africa and working as a humanitarian aid worker. COVID-19 has helped me to finally dare to turn to my true passion: writing! In this entry I have written down the beautiful memories of my happy childhood, of which I remember the sounds very vividly!
Age: 40

Whenever I think of my childhood, I hear sounds… the sounds of doors. They are the soothing soundtrack to a series of beautiful memories. Memories of happy times in cozy spaces. The muffled sound of the living room door in my parents’ house. And with that the slow tapping of my father’s footsteps. The clack when he put his briefcase down. The end of the day. Everyone home. I felt safe and warm.

Or the festive tinkling of my grandparents’ front door. Each time that happily surprised smile on my grandmother’s face when she saw me standing in front of it. I could spend hours listening to the sounds of that house. The keys jingling in the porcelain cup on the windowsill, the doves cooing in the garden. Grandma looking for something in her precious dresser. How she would make the copper handles tick against the shiny mahogany wood. Delving into it, exploring an endless stock of cards, paperclips and shiny buttons, like Ali Baba’s cave. I loved my grandmother, and everything in her wonderful welcoming home.

And finally, the squeaking doors in the house at the seaside. It was as if the wind and the sand had taken possession of the wood. Noises that were much too loud for this small cottage plunged in silence. But still these sounds felt like gentle waves. Because everything between these walls breathed safety and softness. I wanted to stay in that house forever, pretend it was my boat gently rocking on the ocean.

These doors, their sounds, they have given me so much. I carry them with me, like a precious record reminding me of unforgettable times!

Roelina Bosma

Location: Ontario, Canada
About: My childhood had a lot of challenges and it's been fun to relive some of the good memories I have from that time.
Age: 37

Strangely the room I have the most vivid memories of from childhood is my parent’s bedroom in the original Trenton house. I say strangely because I was rarely allowed in it. I loved playing on the waterbed and the swishy, sploshy sounds it made. To my little 5-6 year old self it felt like I was actually riding waves. I remember that the bed rails were actual rails and would come off if you leaned on them causing you to fall off the bed with them. I remember the built in wall cupboards with the red doors and rooting around for my Christmas presents. Finding them one year excited by what I was getting, then feeling very let down on Christmas morning as there were no surprises. I never looked for presents again after that.

I remember looking through my mom’s dresses and thinking they were so pretty. I also remember my kindergarten self wanting to put them in a different order as her order made my head hurt. There was a reason I had to start putting my own laundry away at a young age. My mom would put it away, come in to get out clothes for me and find I’d rearranged them. I loved to sit in the bottom of her closet amongst her shoes. I loved sitting in the dark and confined space. I felt invisible which was a feeling I loved.

Mom and dad also had a built in desk/vanity in front of a giant mirror. I loved to sit on it. I just had to try and not get caught by mom. Dad would see me there and pretend he didn’t see me. I loved to sit up there and read. I remember this room feeling so huge when I was a kid. I remember going back into that room when I was 17. Years after Oma and Opa had moved into that side of the house looking for a book on World War 2 and the Battle of Arnem and thinking I don’t remember this room being so small.

The built in vanity usit that I had used as a reading nook had felt like a huge platform with infinite space when I was five. Now it looked so small I couldn’t imagine I ever sat so comfortable on top of it. My parents' new bedroom in the new side of the house never felt as welcoming.

49. The Architecture of Memory – Morgan Jerkins