My Mom Let Me Color On The Walls And I Never Stopped…

When I was 12 years old, my family of 7 decided to move into an 800 square foot house that was built in the 1940s.

As you can imagine, I was far from excited.

The house had two bedrooms, one bathroom, and the floors didn’t just squeak, they screamed. The house smelled like a book from the 1800s that had been left out in the rain. My parents squeezed five twin-beds into the room I shared with my four younger sisters. CHAOS ENSUED. We fought when someone walked through the house in the middle of the night. We fought about who got the most space to hang their clothes on the metal rods that hung above our beds. Someone was always crying, screaming and screeching. All I wanted was my own space. 

Then one day my mom came into our room…

…and told us we could do anything we wanted to the walls in our shared bedroom - color on them, paint them - whatever we could think up was allowed. I.was.stoked. I grabbed my half-dried out Crayola markers and Sharpies and went to town. One of the four corners in that bedroom became my wall - and it was my space to write my name in cursive, draw hearts, and tattoo with all of the things I loved: you know, like the name of the boy I was too afraid to talk to (hello, Jett!) and my favorite Jack Johnson song lyrics. That corner was all mine. 

My corner of that cramped room was a little space, but it gave me the independence my tweenage mind craved. It's drywall canvas gave me an opportunity to create my own space and gave me my own sense of place in a cramped house. And, now, with every new space I live, that little wall reminds me of the beauty of my own corner of the world.

My corner reminds me of the importance of creating places to laugh, dream and escape.

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