A Little Dirt Doesn't Hurt
Alex Martin (she/her)
Editorial Team Member
Slowly stepping into my rather familiar mudroom, I slide off my rain boots as the remnants of the lousy weather pool around my feet. Greeted by the loud pounding of my dog's tail and the joyful screams of my brothers wrestling upstairs, I am filled with a sense of warmth, a sense of family. This is how I’ve always grown up; there was always noise, always mess, but most of all, a happy family. It has been a routine to come home to noise, to a bit of dust on the ground, or to things found in nature by my brothers. Often I see prints on the floors of tiny sneakers, paw prints, or the most recent crafts my siblings have spent hours working on. Each day was something new, something that delves into the mind of a child, creating something so unique from something so simple. This creativity often resulted in a mess, but this mess was my comfort.
Growing up in this environment I often found I am most focused or comfortable in areas of noise or mess. I liked the noises of New York City when my family visited, or the chatter of students roaming the halls while taking a test. Something about having an environment of noise and clutter was a reminder of togetherness, that people really live and love in these areas. Often, a messy household has a strong astigmatism around how children are raised, that a messy household equals a messy life. I believe messiness should be deemed as a place of love, something that was so loved there was an opportunity to create a livable environment out of. A place where people can laugh, hug, cry, and mourn and be comfortable with it. I tend to think about the feeling of an eerily clean house, where no dust remains on any surface, no chatter of little brothers forming a house out of sticks and leaves they found outside, and no feeling of comfort. It’s just a house.
As I approach senior year and start to look for my new place of messiness for the next four years, I am proud to say my house wasn’t just a house. It wasn’t just a physical shelter, it was a place being constantly lived in, a place of love. As I move away from what I called home for the majority of my life, I have aspired to search for the mess in every environment, to appreciate the rain pooling around my feet after I slide my rain boots off, and to ultimately acknowledge; A little dirt doesn’t hurt.
