Bathroom Stall Walls

Why do we (girls) write our hearts out on the bathroom stall walls?

I walked into a stall not too long ago and looked around at unashamed proclamations of love, among other phrases and a variety of nonsense. Why is that we feel so free to write our hearts so publicly? Why is that we can to tell our deepest thoughts and feelings to anyone who happens to read these walls?

Is it because we want to be heard? Is it because, on some level, we hope it will be more true when we write it. And, if it's written then it will be read. Are we so loose with our hearts and dreams that we share ourselves on dirty walls surrounding a toilet. If so, what does that mean?

Are we searching for validation? From whom? Only girls go into these stalls. Who are we speaking to? Other girls or ourselves? Are we such crazy-hearted girls that we must stake our claims in bathrooms - for our hearts to be read and reread by those who enter. What if what is written is never read? Is that where our thoughts and feelings die? What happens after the stall walls are full? Do we search to carve out our own space?

Through the madness of it all, there is something appealing about a crazy-hearted girl writing her love on the bathroom stall wall. It's not where I've chosen to tell the world my heart but it's something. What if we go through life and never express what we feel. Confession: I've never written on a bathroom stall wall but I've always wanted to. To be honest, I always thought those girls who did were brave (and a little foolish). More than anything, I was always afraid of what others might think. That's the point though. It's not about everyone else. In that moment of passion and craziness, it's about what's in the heart. What is dying to come out...out on the bathroom stall wall.

At some point, we leave that world behind. I wonder why? (Besides the fact that defacing public property is against the law.) Is that because we become ashamed of our hearts - insecure and unsure of ourselves? I believe we begin to censor ourselves as we mature and I don't think that's a bad thing. But, in our maturation, we can begin to filter parts of ourselves that were never meant to be filtered.

So, how do we liberate those places we've unnecessarily covered? We could start in the bathroom...