Secret Rooms

I don't know why people are so keen to put the details of their private life in public;

they forget that invisibility is a super power.

- Banksy

One of my all-time favorite books is The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank, which tells the true story of Jews going into hiding from the Nazis in 1940s Amsterdam - all from the perspective of a highly normal teenage girl. I've read Anne's diary over and over. For some reason, I am obsessed with it. In fact, I am also in the process of collecting any and all related books and films about Anne's life.

When people ask me what I like about The Diary of a Young Girl, I tend to list Anne's personality first. Yes, she is one of those famous people, like Michael Jackson, who took a step toward me out of the annals of time and now feels like a friend. Secondly, I'll explain that I find myself attracted to the idea of ordinary people living under extraordinary circumstances. Stories like Anne's offer some semblance of an answer to the question, "What would I do if I had to face the unthinkable?"

Not much lower on the list of my personal pros for this book, though, is quite simply this: I love secret rooms. Anne herself, perhaps more than anyone else in the group in hiding, caught a glimpse of the mystery and magic of living in a secret annex. She was still young and romantic enough to see the fun in it, at least in the beginning, when the experience of going into hiding still seemed like a novel adventure.

Those rooms in the back of that Amsterdam office building, hidden behind a swinging bookcase, will forever hold a special place in the hearts of millions who cherish Anne's story. In my case, they also speak to a lifelong fascination with secret rooms. As a child I had recurring dreams about discovering secret rooms in the houses of family and friends. I'd open a special door and there it was, an ordinary space, full of ordinary things, and yet it was special because it was hidden. You could feel the mystery in the air.

Jews in 1940s Europe were hiding from a predator that sought nothing less than their lives. For them, hiding was about literal physical survival. But there are other reasons to hide, too. There are noble and beautiful reasons to want to go where no one can see you, to be hidden, to be alone. And there are other kinds of survival to be concerned about as well.

To me, it has always been important to keep some things in life a secret. There are parts of my heart that can be damaged by too much exposure to the outside world. Of course, openness and honesty are important, but there are times when flinging wide the doors to my soul is actually the opposite of honesty, because I have failed to be honest with myself. I know which things are too sacred, too painful, too beautiful to be shared. For a while, at least, they need to stay inside the secret rooms of my psyche, safe from the ceaseless pressure of being viewed and reviewed, judged and evaluated. Sometimes I find that I need to go into hiding, to be nourished and protected in the shadows of obscurity, that special space that only God and I can see.