When you walk into my room, the first thing you’ll notice is the mess. Carefully crafted, it’s made by the craziest tornado you’ve ever seen, me. There’s clutter and junk on every surface, clean and dirty clothes pouring out of the same basket, and bags lying around, waiting to be used. Even though I swear my system works, it’s a scene that could send minimalists into cardiac arrest. In the miraculous scenario where you’re not driven out by disgust at first glance, I bet you’ll notice my walls.
Decorated in chaotic harmony, my white walls are barely visible. They’re covered with plastic vines draped across posters, photographs mixed with medals, and certificates next to art prints. My tightly packed floating shelves hold trophies squished beside books, jammed between trinkets and my collection of unusually scented candles. The setup reminds me of our family camping trips, where sleeping arrangements are more like sardine-packing challenges. Except in this room, it’s not my relatives that are pressed together—it’s my memories.
I honestly don’t know why I haven’t brought out the extra shelves hiding in my “closet of many mysteries.” Maybe it’s because I like the way things are—how everything has no choice but to exist side by side. It symbolizes something I wish I could do. Like the objects in my room, the identities I carry don’t need more space to be perfectly organized; they need less distance to stay connected. Perhaps the tornado inside me simply longs for connection.
My mother holds a different perspective, of course.
Cleaning is strongly encouraged in my household. However, because I’ve found myself using the broom more as a microphone than a tool for cleaning, I’ve abandoned any serious attempt at organizing. I’ve heard my room looks like trash thrown together—a pigsty, as my mom likes to say. But in my safe haven of a bedroom, every piece of clutter and clothing has a purpose, even if that purpose is only known to me. The crooked crucifix on my wall, for example, looks like I put it up with my eyes closed. It’s actually placed intentionally—just in the frame of my mirror—to serve as a quiet reminder to ground myself when my reflection tries to convince me I’m drowning in my own flaws.
When my stubborn insomnia clings to me like my younger siblings, I find comfort in my three favorite books within arm’s reach. Within the same distance sits a tall mason jar of collected seashells. It’s on the verge of bursting open, but I can’t bring myself to move it. Unlike my crucifix and books, it doesn’t comfort me; it doesn’t remind me of anything significant. I just like the way it looks. In my room, things can simply be. My room, in its delightful disarray, tells my story. Each item is a paragraph in the long narrative of my life.
Full of twisted plots and characters who come and go, the story of my life is retold by the objects I hold on to; they help me remember who I am. That’s why when my mother told me it was time for a “Summer Declutter,” you could say I didn’t just panic—I cracked a little.
Declutter, defined by the Meriam- Webster dictionary, means to remove clutter from a room or an area. I, on the other hand, didn’t want to remove the so-called “clutter” from my area. My room is my museum of memory. Five empty scrapbooks sit in my desk, but my room is a scrapbook I didn’t mean to create and couldn’t stop myself from filling. Every vine, photograph, medal, certificate, book, trinket, or candle is a piece of me. They don’t just help me remember—they help me exist. I wouldn’t be lying if I said I’m scared of forgetting, but the fear of being forgotten runs deeper.
That fear, the aching desire to belong somewhere, has shaped my whole life.
Like a child who’s lost a puzzle piece, I’ve spent most of my time searching for identity, trying to label my mess and fit into any box I can find. Sure, I may not have looked under the couch for completion, but it’s crossed my mind. The puzzle I’m meant to be has transformed into an abstract collage—years of failures and accomplishments jammed together, held by duct tape and superglue, stitched together by moments of growth and breakdowns. I used to think something was wrong with that. Now I think it might be the most honest thing about me.
Honesty doesn’t make things easier—especially when I used those same materials to mold myself into different versions of who I needed to be, rotating personalities depending on who I was with.
In my advanced classes, I’m expected to speak with definitive fluency. I cage my poetic side—the part of me that wants to ask strange, complicated questions no one wants to answer. There’s no room for abstract creativity on the pre-paved pathways to success. I’m told not to be so “artsy” around future doctors and lawyers because I might “distract” them from their path. In my opinion, if a conversation about two Greek lovers derails your passion for medicine, you might want to reconsider your career choice.
Still, those conversations are only allowed in the “right” rooms. Outside of them, you’re better off pretending your passions are the usual, basic and practical. Liberal arts? Communications? Creative careers? Off the table. Even if your childhood dream of being a professional athlete hasn’t been crushed yet, it should be. Apparently, the grass is no longer real anyway.
And it doesn’t end in the classroom. On the soccer field, it’s the same thing.
The mention of ASB (associated student body) or Speech and Debate draws more silence than a missed penalty kick. Not being athletic enough for my team stings more than the soccer ball that’s nearly broken my nose—twice. I’m expected to keep my head in the game, not the clouds. I push away my academic side and tuck away the pride I feel from my achievements. If I pretend a side of me doesn’t exist, I can make things easier for everyone—my dad, my teammates. I can make myself easier to swallow.
At home, it’s not any simpler. If anything, the contrast sharpens.
My suggestions of table manners and unnecessarily large words earn glares, as if I’ve served the carne asada unseasoned and without frijoles y arroz. Calling someone “socially inept” when they put their feet on the table doesn’t translate very well. When my throat goes dry, coated with a mixture of frustration and embarrassment, my tongue goes with it, forgetting my native language entirely.
My social life and home life may be different, but the outcome is the same. My friends say I should take things more seriously—stop singing and dancing in public. My parents say the opposite: stop taking everything so seriously, because burnout has hovered over my shoulder since fifth grade. Somewhere between the two, I’ve lost track of which parts of me are “too much” and which are “not enough.” So, I apologize constantly, reassuring everyone I’ve accidentally offended whenever the “wrong” version of me slips out at the “wrong” time.
Eventually, I realized something: it’s not possible to condense yourself into something digestible for people who don’t want to understand you. In trying to do so, I neglected the only version of me that mattered—the one that made me feel whole.
No matter how hard I try, a life of mundanity will never be enough.
If my room can’t stick to one theme, how can I? I’ve searched for myself in between the lines of the universe, asking for the privilege of identity, only to find nothing. My unbearable desire to be understood just grew heavier. As the rarest Myers-Briggs personality type, it’s hard to find someone who can make sense of half the nonsense I say. I constantly swam through waves of exulansis—the ache of not being able to explain parts of yourself because no one else gets it.
It gets lonely, and often feels like I’m stuck on the edge of a cliff, wondering if I should take a leap of faith.
And I did, once.
Spoiler alert: I fell.
I fell in love with myself.
That was my turning point.
I’ve since learned that no amount of perfection will ever be enough for a world determined to misunderstand you. That’s why I stopped trying to fit. I stopped apologizing for who I am. Call me dramatic. Call me idealistic. Or even, if you must, a little full of myself. But if I’m going to fall in love with something, it might as well be me.
I embrace the poet in me who sees metaphors in clutter. I give credence to the filmmaker in me who finds stories in silence and seashells. I’m at peace with the athlete in me who uses sports as an outlet, not an identity. I celebrate being a Speech and Debate kid who does both platform and interpretation events. I use big words because I like the way they roll off my tongue. I dance in malls and sing in restaurants because I can. I set boundaries and do what makes me happy. I no longer pick the “right” version of me for the room I’m in.
I’ve accepted that my room will always be cluttered. It’s time I accept that I will be, too.
The chaos in my room is personal. The tangled mess of passions and possessions is the reflection of someone who refuses to be boxed in. My clutter isn’t just clutter—it’s memory, meaning, survival— my truest identity. Yes, it’s all crammed together like books on an overcrowded shelf, but my room is filled with puzzle pieces that don’t need to fit together perfectly to create something meaningful.
We are all mosaics. We’re made up of mismatched shards and crooked lines. We’re complicated and messy. But most importantly, we are human. Identity cannot be proven singularly and simply. It’s a lifelong layering of phases, experiences, and decisions.
Whether it’s the crucifix on my wall or the jar of seashells that just looks nice, everything in my room—and everything in me—has its place. Even the parts that seem random, they’re meant to be there.
In the end, I’ll never be the cleanest or most organized person. I’ll never be what any room expects. I’ll never be something everyone enjoys.
But I will always be whole.
Whole in my ups.
Whole in my downs.
Whole in my beautiful chaos.
Whole in my refusal to shrink.
My room was never meant for a summer declutter.
Author’s Note:
On the first day of summer, my mother told me I needed to declutter my room before I left for Speech and Debate Nationals. At the time, I was in a very raw and emotional state due to my S&D pieces being so personal and heavy to rehearse. In the process of trying to throw out junk and honor my individuality through S&D, I realized my room was more than a reflection of myself—it’s physical proof that I am not one or another of something, I’m everything, everywhere, all at once. This piece represents more than a “Summer Declutter”, it’s a love letter of acceptance and an apology letter to myself for trying to separate who I am for other people; I can only hope it inspires someone else to accept themselves.
Bailey Palencia | 13 | Los Angeles, CA | @b4iley_b0o on Instagram
