For the most part, summer break is lovely. There’s sun, old friends, great books, swimming, and warmth. However, what is not so fun is the fact that the break means four months without college friends. I now fully understand the appeal of going to a state school: Your new friends are easily road trip-able. But my best friends live in Pennsylvania, Maryland and Georgia. The first two are manageable, but Georgia? That’s much too long a drive for me.

And the Georgian is the one that will be my roommate next year, so it is especially sad. But one way that Hannah (the Georgian) and I have been staying in touch is by planning our room for next year. We’re really quite excited. What’s making the process so exciting is that we are attempting the impossible: Making a dorm room into a sanctuary. Last year was pretty stressful for both of us, and we do NOT want a repeat. So, we are researching ways in which we can create calming surroundings.

First, as I’ve written about before, we’re planning on feng shui-ing our room, as much as possible. After researching feng shui during our second semester, we realized that our respective rooms were really not energetically sound. Next year, that will change.

We’re also planning on getting thin curtains for our window. The window shades that are provided are of a thick white plastic. They tend to get stuck in a completely-closed position so that there is absolutely no natural light in the room at all. We figure that that is not good (we could get Seasonal Affective Disorder!). Thin curtains would allow natural light to get into our room so that our environment isn’t so dark. We don’t do well with dark.

For the concrete walls, we’re going to get pretty-colored cloth and fabric paint and make our own tapestries, which will double as a friendship mural. It will be filled with images and symbols of peace and happiness–perfect for a fresh start and less stress.

And finally, we’re going to get Tibetan prayer flags to hang in our room. The most common kind is the Wind Horse (Lung-ta), which means “Wish Fulfilling Jewel of Enlightenment” and is a horizontally hung set of five flags of red, blue, green, white and yellow. These colors represent the five elements of, respectively, fire, sky/space, water, wind/air and Earth. The Wind Horse, the central animal depiction on the prayer flags, is flanked on either side by the four great animals: Garuda (wisdom), Dragon (strength), Tiger (confidence), and Snow Lion (joy).

Prayer flags are meant to promote harmony, and when placed should be done so with the feeling that all beings, not just you, will benefit from them. Only then will the powers of the prayer flags bring true happiness and harmony.

Note to self: A serene room = a serene mind.

Lily Berthold-Bond grew up in a chemical-free zone and has struggled her whole life to understand and accept this non-commercial lifestyle. Now a sophomore at Tufts University, she has embraced her green life and hopes to share its possibilities with the rest of her generation.