Students share secrets in the library

Author: Eleanor Johnstone

Last week, Middlebury students checking their mailboxes found invitations to share their secrets à la PostSecret, a Maryland-based community art project that invites people to anonymously share private thoughts or moments - funny or serious - in an artistic fashion. Cards reveal the dry wit that some are too inhibited to admit to in real life, while other participants use the medium to confess sins and face their emotional trials through collages of images and text. Individuals draw, paint, cut out images from magazines or newspapers and use anything from photographs to old parking tickets to embellish their postcards - and secrets - in creative and personal ways. Created by Frank Warren, this growing trend of illustrating and posting one's secret for the world to see caught the attention of Xander Manshel '09 who, with the help and support of the Wonnacott Commons Office, sent those white cards to students' campus mailboxes, inviting their own participation in this powerful artistic community.

A real strength of Warren's project is the fact that as long as it is a secret, you can send it in on a postcard. As such, secrets cover an immensely broad spectrum and touch on such topics as relationships, wishes, fears, admissions of deeply personal habits or thoughts, fantasies, insecurity, love, grief, etc. Each Sunday Warren uploads approximately 20 new secrets to the world on his web site, http://postsecret.blogspot.com. Many people who have contributed to the project describe the experience of posting their secret as therapeutic. More importantly, reading others' secrets can open up avenues of introspection and self-evaluation that often go unnoticed. How many times do we read something for class, watch a film, attend a performance of any kind, and experience some kind of small personal epiphany? Inspiration pounces at improbable moments in unlikely places.

The PostSecret practice has been capturing the world's deepest, darkest secrets since its conception in 2003 when Le Petit Prince crept into Warren's imagination on the cover of three Parisian postcards. After a lucid dream that left Warren with the phrase, "unrecognized evidence, from forgotten journeys, unknowingly rediscovered," he created the "reluctant oracle project," setting 47 bottled postcard messages such as "Your question is a misunderstood answer" anonymously afloat in Maryland's lakes. The final message, "You will find your answer in the secrets of strangers," was the beginning of PostSecret. Participants send their secrets to an address in Germantown, Md., where a small combination is chosen by Warren to post on the site. They may also be reserved for publication in a PostSecret book, of which there are currently four. So far 180,000 secrets have been received.

Perhaps due to the harsh cold or to our general disregard for snail mail, PostSecret has been hitting the Middlebury student body irregularly. Journalistic inquiries have been received with a mixture of puzzled dismissals, vague enthusiasm, exclamations of recognition and sober consideration.

"My first reaction was 'why?'" said Elizabeth Goffe '10. "I'm open to it though, and eager to see how it works out."

Other students have taken a more serious approach.

"I think this is another example of our generation's and nation's inability to communicate with each other," said George Heinrichs '10, who recognized the relief that writing down a secret can provide but maintains that "until we can talk to each other, until we can communicate in person and express ourselves, reveal ourselves to our friends, there will be no true outlet for our feelings and secrets."

Alexandra Schloss '09.5 sees the project as a way of breaking through the standard surface interactions that many students float by on. Pointing out that students' conversations often turn to the tried-and-true topic of homework rather than exploring the deeper reaches of individuals, she observed that "it can feel extremely liberating to get your thoughts out there - in a very candid way - that most people never feel they are afforded."

Nerina Cocchi '10 views the project on campus with a little less gravity. "I think it's just a little game, and that it shouldn't be taken too seriously," said Cocchi. But on one level, it could be one of the many symptoms of how some issues are not addressed, and that people, and not the College, should personally find a way to address these issues." Cocchi further critiqued the concept of publishing a secret, even anonymously. "The fact that the PostSecret thing is individual, in my opinion, destroys the purpose a little. One, there is no occasion for response, and two, there is no discussion of the 'issue' at any level," she said.

Schloss enjoys the directness and finality of a postcard. "A person receives the card and that is that. Potential end of story." Furthermore, a postcard presents a message in a unique format. "There is no cover - no envelope, no wrapping - so you have no time to prepare for what you might see. You just see it," she said.

"So much of college interaction is based on pretense. It would be incredibly refreshing to just hear something small and honest," agreed Sara Swartzwelder '09. "My guess is, PostSecret is really going to make my day. I don't think it'll change anything on the surface, the way people interact, but I think that's the beauty of it, and that's the only reason why it will work. It might just prove that a lot more people than you think are in the same boat as you."

Though views on the project vary, all students who were interviewed expressed the same fundamental sentiment - there's a lot that we don't know about each other. Perhaps midterms are beginning to raise a fog around your social life and make your personal one feel less presentable. Perhaps baring yourself to a friend or making a new acquaintance seems like one more meeting to add to the list. But then perhaps strolling into the library for yet another late-night study group and bumping into a bit of witty honesty or a thought-provoking confession will touch on something you did notquite know was there. Given the opportunity to procrastinate the daily workload and get creative with your new discovery, why not?

Middlebury PostSecrets can be submitted at a number of locations across campus. There are boxes in each Commons office as well as in the atrium of the New Library. The exhibit, organized by Manshel, will be on display beginning early next week in the library. Manshel is currently working with the Offices of Health and Wellness, Institutional Diversity and Counseling in the hopes of organizing a wrap-up event toward the end of the exhibit's run. Once taken down the cards will be arranged for publication in a new installment of the PostSecret books.