Secrets

Another reason I graduated GW too early: through the GW English blog, I stumbled upon this guy who recently gave a lecture at Lisner Auditorium. His name is Pete Warren, and he started this public art project several years ago to solicit people to send anonymous secrets on postcards. The idea is everyone hides things they're afraid to tell other people, but the catharsis of writing it down and sending it out into the universe must be strangely exhilarating and freeing. Warren is now famous (but not so famous I hadn't already heard of him) for his collection of secrets and has published a series of books featuring these postcards. For a better idea of the types of secrets and imaginative, creative postcards he receives, visit his blog, which he updates weekly.

Now, it may sound like a simple idea, but it's really scratched into my brain and stayed there. Of course I have secrets, but if I could write down just one sentence on a postcard in order to mail it away, what would I say? Even if I can't be completely honest with others, it's an interesting exercise in trying to at least be honest with myself.

In this semi-anonymous forum of blogging, I have a couple new secrets to share. They aren't the major ones I'd save for a postcard no one who knows me would read. Or no one who knows me would read it and know I was the author. But maybe I'll still feel better for sending my confessions off into cyberspace. Or writing it will make them less consequential, even trivial.

1. I am on a strict budget and yet I spent $50 at Banana Republic last week. I bought four sweaters for an average price of $12, which is actually a great bargain, but I knew I shouldn't spend money on anything but necessities. I didn't tell anyone because I felt guilty.

2. I didn't leave the apartment except to go to the gym for the last three days. I feel like I should want to jump out of my skin, but I don't. I worry that maybe I enjoy being alone.

Your turn. Think about your secrets.