I’m coming off a week in Ohio - a place where I spent a majority of my early childhood years. I have a ritual every time I return to my childhood bedroom. I spread out on the carpeted floor and unpack the journals, scrapbooks and photo albums from the first eighteen years of my life. Each time I return to this ritual, I emerge with new takeaways. This time, I was on the hunt for cultural indicia that would have informed my future sense of taste.
1. Summer Reading List, 2003
Apparently I had quite the eclectic reading list in the summer of 2003. These were the summers when the local public library in Akron hosted reading challenges. Anyone who filled out a book log with 10+ books received a free Happy Meal from McDonalds. Wholesome and a potentially problematic incentivization mechanism?
As uncurated as this reading list may appear, it speaks to the types of stories I was drawn to as a pre-teen - character-driven stories of adversity. I loved books about runways and young people prematurely taking on adult roles. As many kids growing up in the suburbs, literature helped export me far away from my own small existence, even if those places were consumed with dark complexities.
2. Beethoven Lives Upstairs, 1989
Beethoven Lives Upstairs is a dramatized fictional audio tale of a young boy, Christoph, who lived in the same apartment building as Beethoven in early 19th Century Vienna. Set against the backdrop of Beethoven’s symphonies, Christoph tells of his initially contentious relationship with the manic Beethoven which ultimately results in mutual kinship.
I probably purchased this CD around the age of ten, when I was in my classical music prime. From ages seven to eleven my family lived in New York and I assumed the persona of a child who wanted so badly to be a child prodigy. Spoiler alert - I was nothing of the sort.
I took piano lessons at Carnegie Hall and had big dreams of going to Juilliard. When my family moved back to Ohio, I abandoned piano and started listening to the Beatles.
3. Phantom of the Opera, 2004
Hot take - I preferred the Phantom of the Opera (2004) film directed by Joel Schumacher waaay more than the live action Broadway performance. From 2004-2006 I listened to the soundtrack on my CD player every night, curlers in my hair inspired by Emmy Rossum, and dreamt of her steamy, Past the Point of No Return, duo with Gerard Butler.
4. Entre Nous- A Woman’s Guide to Finding Her Inner French Girl, by Debra Ollivier
My parents were always bewildered as to why and how their Turkish-American daughter raised in Akron, Ohio, could possibly be a Francophile. I credit the Madeleine books for subconsciously influencing my aesthetic and later on driving my attraction to books like Entre Nous. Entre Nous began a many year pre-living in Paris guide to becoming what I thought was a sophisticated woman. My main takeaways at thirteen years old? You can thrive off of three black dresses & an Hermès scarf and monogamy is optional.
I leave you with a clip of an incredible Marie Antoinette doll I was gifted for my fifteenth birthday. Merci Sofia Coppola and Kirsten Dunst for inspiring my early obsession.