On the night of Friday, Feb. 24, candlelight and music filled the walls of the Lankford Student Union Ballroom. The tables, draped in black table- cloths, were adorned with at least 150 cards reveal- ing the deep and anonymous secrets of the stu- dents, and even professors, of Longwood. Secrets ranged from the lighthearted to the tragic, but they all contributed to the singular theme of the event: you are not alone.
Organized by the Resident Assistant (RA) com- munity of the Stubbs and Arc resident halls, Long- wood Secrets was meant to provide an outlet for those who had a secret but were unable to share them with anyone. According to RAs Sophie Shel- ton and Jessica Young, Longwood Secrets was in- spired by Post Secret, an international art project started by Frank Warren.
Post Secret serves as an outlet for those who have secrets and wish to cleanse themselves of that knowledge in an anonymous way. Participants will decorate a postcard and scribe their secret then send it to Post Secret, where the postcards will then be displayed on the Post Secret website.
Inspired by Post Secret, the RA community of Arc and Stubbs decided to tailor its concept to fit their annual campus-wide event. Young, an RA in Stubbs, said, "I enjoy going to Post Secret, and as an RA you're told about the statistics about de- pression and suicide [on] campus, and now you're starting to hear more and more about bullying and we thought we all needed to be brought together through our campus-wide [event]. Post Secret is a way for us to be connected. Secrets can be ‘I've liked you since the third grade' to serious things like ‘I was molested,' so it's really come to a realiza- tion that everyone has a secret and everyone needs that outlet ... but do that in a way that everyone's anonymity is kept."
Kimberly Pyle, an RA in Frazer, said, "I have several of the Post Secret books, and I love reading them and have never had the courage to send my secrets in. Having the same aspect at a Longwood scope made me feel more secure about telling the world my secrets."
Even the reveal of the event proved to be a se- cret. According to Young, The eight members of the Stubbs and Arc RA staff and even the Resi- dence Education Coordinator (REC), Sam Catron, split up into committees in order to hold the event: advertising, envelope and reveal. The advertising committee publicized the event with various post- ers displayed on campus, the envelope committee was in charge of preparing the envelopes and cards
for people to personalize them and the reveal com- mittee organized the event as it was shown to the public. The reveal committee kept their plans secret until the reveal on Friday night.
"We went through every single idea in the book," said Shelton, an RA in Arc, who was a member of the reveal committee. "We didn't come up with the idea until literally, maybe a week before the event. [Catron] said he wanted it to be very intimate and essentially said, ‘You're looking into people's souls when you're reading their secrets.' So we had all the lights off with candles in the middle of the ta- bles so you had to get up close to read the secrets. We were thinking that it wasn't so much a cheerful event. It's good that people are letting go and get- ting their secrets out, but we didn't want it to be all hype."
"I thought the reveal went off without a hitch," said Young. "I was amazed at how many people came out to look at the secrets. It was beautiful be- ing able to read all of the secrets, and I loved watch- ing others and seeing how they all reacted."
Lauren D'Agostino, a Longwood senior, added, "It was really moving. Reading the secrets written by fellow students and seeing many identical ones shows that we are all fighting the same battles and we need to be open to our peers and help them through their struggles."
Shelton revealed that on the first day of collecting secrets, only three had been turned in. "We thought, maybe this isn't going to pick up," she said. After a few days, more came in and on the final day, "we got a text message from Catron saying that he had just picked up 50 secrets from the post office."
"I personally submitted a secret," D'Agostino said. "And submitting it was a good form of ther- apy for me. I saw a lot of people tearing up while reading some of the deeper secrets, and I definitely felt empathy for the authors of each secret, know- ing how hard it was for them to confess them."
"It was very emotional to walk around and read everyone's secrets, seeing what people had the courage to admit, seeing what people you wish you could help," Pyle continued. "I felt really help- less reading all of these sad secrets, wanting to help these people who I'd have no way of contacting. I think the main thing I wanted to do was just let ev- eryone know that I saw, and believe that it can get better."
Though Young and Shelton will not be back as RAs next year, they hope that those who will stay on staff will repeat this event again next year. Those who missed the event can view all of the secrets on YouTube by searching "Longwood Secrets."
