Welcome, Wanderer.
The Attic is both birthing ground and graveyard, and exists as the type of living, breathing paradox our Minds tend to avoid when we forget how to feel through life.
Yes, and….
It is where I birth creations that tend to colour very much outside the lines. It is also the place of death - of former selves, of projects that no longer align, of growth that is honest enough to kill its darlings and unapologetically say “no” when the world screams to continue. Nothing here is a permanent representative of me - and yet, every bit of it deserves to breathe.
For me, it is a living altar: everything has been done with intention and meaning infused into it, and like anything with breath that’s connected to its true nature: it may change, drastically, at any moment.
As both mother and student of the Attic, I relate everything back to peeling layers of the Self - and so you will find that this website mirrors that journey of unraveling. The more you explore where you’d rather not… the more magic you shall find.
Maybe life is like that, too.
about the Keeper of the Attic
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about the Keeper of the Attic 〰️
My name is Melissa Nathalia de Blok -
and I am a world builder.
When I was little, I spent most of my time alone in the attic. I was not allowed to play outside, and visitors were a rare but glamorous event. I had a reading nook, a secret little hideout with shiny gold tiger-stripe material, and a tiny carpeted room with a computer and a cassette recorder. I built worlds on my computer games, made up characters and conversations with my dolls, choreographed dances with imaginary people, disappeared into other worlds in my books, and spent hours rewinding my favourite rap and pop songs in order to learn the lyrics and pretend I was secretly a popstar. I was not a popular child and experienced a lot of abandonment from all sides - but I was never alone in my attic of magic.
It was the birth place of all that I create, and the roots of who I truly am.
And in some ways, it works as a metaphor - because all that you truly need can be found in your own attic, if you just know where to look.
In every identity that I have worn like a cloak, and every role that I've played in other people's lives as well as my own - I have found that true empowerment lies in returning to yourself. Remembering who you are is the only way to be the hero in your story. That is where home lies.
“Wtf do you do??”
I’ve received this question often. Even from friends.
Underneath it all, the business suits and the performer outfits, I am a writer.
But I do - and create - a lot of things.
Recently, I decided to fully surrender to the not knowing of it all, and proudly say “I don’t know.”
The Attic is my birthing ground - from here, you’ll find everything I choose to create over time.
