The one about doorways and belonging

I’m breathing a big sigh of relief because we’ve officially finished our 3rd school year in Nigeria. In a nutshell, this year was hard. But now that it’s over, it seems fine. Kinda like childbirth.

Soon after the war began in late February this year, we received a security notice that American Schools in Nigeria were being targeted for terrorist attacks. The school increased its security, but still, sending our kids to school felt horrible for a while.

Additionally, this year, traffic was worse than ever. This was due to extreme road deterioration in the Fall, followed by construction to repair it in the Spring. I’m happy to report that in mid-April, the roads were finally functional and maybe better than ever. For the first time since living here, we were able to push the school bus departure time from 6:05 AM to 6:40 AM. I’ve cherished the extra sleep.

We’ve lived here almost three years, but in many ways, Nigeria feels exactly the same. Even with a new road and a new airport wing (because they managed to accidently burn the old one down earlier this year).

But one difference I can palpably feel is my own sense of belonging here.

When we first moved, I remember how ugly our company house was. I wanted to simultaneously cry and die upon walking inside every day. The window treatments were vinyl vertical blinds coated in grime and dust. The ceiling held old light fixtures with cheap LED blue tone light bulbs inside.

And, of course, there were the doors.

The inside of the doors had been painted cream. Not cream like sand on a beach where you do yoga, but like the teeth of a person-who-drank-1,000-coffees cream. Or pit-stains-on-a-white-shirt kind of cream. Or a color that was supposed to be white and then 100 cigarette smokers moved in and stained it cream, cream. You get the idea.

Slowly, I changed a lot inside the house.

I was able to get in touch with a local seamstress and design my own curtains and couch cushions. She took ideas from a Pinterest collage and concepts in my head and turned them into reality. They are all gorgeous.

I found a local light fixture store, and while the fixtures aren’t perfect, they’re cute and were cost effective. Unfortunately, the ugly tile will stay untouched, because this is a temporary home and we’re not making any big financial investments.

My final decor project was to paint the inside of the doors. I procrastinated on this because Sherwin Williams paint is shockingly expensive in Nigeria and I hate taping to paint. Nonetheless, I set out to eradicate the cream.

What I didn’t realize at the time was that painting these doors would end up being so much more than just a new color.

It was especially therapeutic (or maybe it was the wine). Regardless, I got to thinking about how there’s something about doors and doorways. I think it’s the possibilities that unfold with each new doorway you may walk through. But they affect our brains in other ways too. Have you ever heard of “the doorway effect”? It’s the concept that we forget things when walking through a doorway from one room to another.

Ironically, when the doorway effect was explained to me years ago, it was explained incorrectly. Up until this writing, my understanding was that walking through a doorway helps you remember things. So, for years I was deliberately finding doorways to walk through to remember where I left my keys and phone, while actually giving myself doorway-induced dementia.

I love our green doors. I knew I would from a visual perspective, but over the past years, it’s more than that. They’ve given me this sense of belonging in a strange place that I wasn’t expecting.

In a small way, the doors now say, “the Rose family is here.”

I remember at the time choosing deep green because I was feeling earthy. But it’s since dawned on me that deep green and white are also the colors of the Nigerian flag, which feels right. Belonging, even in a place you don’t fully understand, is a lovely feeling. And after almost 3 years, it may even be better than the false hope that walking through a doorway is going to help me recall the last place I put my keys.