I spent the majority of the day unpacking, cleaning, and organizing my room. If you've ever seen my living space in person, you must know this is a monumental and rare achievement.

Now I have a drawer for everything: light-colored jeans, dark-colored jeans, khakis and dark pants all have their own piles. Every last inch of closet and drawer space is filled and ridiculously categorized. This will not last.

Now I have a bookshelf for everything: my growing women's studies shelf, literature (alphabetized, of course), reference, the Harry Potter shelf, textbooks, language, and my favorites: "practical non-fiction" and "theoretical non-fiction." This makes sense, somehow.

And then I took on the stacks of paper. STACKS. I never throw anything away. Not a worksheet, not a day's notes. Just in case the information might, one day, be handy again. So I separated the stacks into new stacks: one for each course I've taken in college, financial matters, mementos, you get the picture.

These stacks... three years of my life until now untouched and uncataloged. Notes in the margins, ludicrous statements, professors' critiques... such a crazy mix of memories and emotions. Oh, just a few:

The unsent letters to Benjamin -- they all said the same thing: I'm not writing this with an expectation of anything from you -- not a renewal of your friendship, not even a reply. This gesture is at least partly selfish, and that being the case, I can't ask anything of you. Thank god I bit my tongue at least once or twice.

Random West Wing quotations: The streets of heaven are too crowded with angels tonight.

I'm on dangling modifier patrol.

Ridiculous musings that never made it to Diaryland, for reasons that ought to be apparent: Sometimes my winamp plays better when I'm not on my computer. Sometimes I write better on paper. There are practical reasons for these things. Which I suppose made sense to me once.

The attempts at being clever: He asked, 'Can I get a dollar's worth of dimes?' as if he were really wondering if he could. Huh?

Topics worth revisiting: As a woman in this society -- a woman who wishes to live for herself alone -- I find I must consciously question myself, doubt my motives. Why do I sometimes like to wear makeup? Why do I care what I look like? Why am I afraid of spiders? I ask myself, lest I conform. I must be vigilant.

Random lyrics that said so much in a moment: How could I explain? How could I explain this to my children if I had them?

Doodles and tattoo prototypes everywhere.

Quotes from classmates: He's a beast. You know what, that's a compliment. And you know what, that's a metaphor.

A classic example of this is a pencil. Both, I believe, are Neil.

Quotes from professors: You go to Burger King and cast your ballot. It's called dollar bills. That's how you vote for beef. -- Delemeester

In the land of the profoundly stupid, who's really wrong? -- DHS

The rough drafts of papers. The sudden ideas for perfect thesis statements scribbled during class. The nearly unreadable final drafts of papers -- my god, how DHS could ever have used the word "brilliant" to describe anything I wrote freshman year is beyond me.

The leadership exam I've wanted to find for months now, in which I knew I had come to some conclusion about the validity of difference versus equality feminism. I had hoped my pre-feminist self had seen through difference "feminism" and [shudder] Gilligan... but no, to my horror and, frankly, amusement, I defended it. Nonsensically.

My first poli sci papers, in which Jackie noted I was showing real aptitude for the subject, and should see her if I could use her help in any way. I remember my freshman self: all the advice books stressed that students should seek their professors out during office hours, but I couldn't think of a single reason to do so. I truly wracked my brain for a way to cultivate a relationship despite my introversion. I was such a freshman.

Dr. O' accusing me of plagiarism for using a word like litany. Which I still maintain is a regular word.

And the DHS papers -- I cannot bear to read more than a paragraph of my writing at a time because somehow or other I always fell short of the bar I'd set for myself (which I only really set high in her classes), but I love the comments. Both things like "Insightful and a pleasure to read" and underlined sentences with a simple, pointed "No." in the margin.

Put it all together, and it's so clear to me how much I have progressed and how much I have let myself down. How many paths I've walked away from and how many new directions I've set out on. The past few years have been quite a journey. And I don't know that there is any easy way to categorize and box them.