Family Secrets

Memories are the ghosts of our past, 

like fugitives they hide from the day, 

only to haunt us at night

when the mind betrays our reality,

altering the history as we have come to know it.

It is we who choose what to remember and what to forget

separating pain from the pleasurable,

gathering the hurt like the fields harvest

and carefully add them to the box, then close the lid.

Yet the pain does not lessen with time,

not until one has learned to forgive

and even then it does not disappear completely,

for the scars have been carved too deep.

Memories are fragile

and are easily lost when not tended to,

though a photograph can capture a moment,

aiding in recalling the past,

it can also uncover, exposing the darkness to light

that others might see, even years later.

Missing pieces of broken emptiness

Neglected, it's beauty fades and character takes hold of the presence.

No place to hide

All I ask is that you look and contemplate the many meanings.

The remains of irreconcilable differences

Listen to the silence . . .

     for they do have voices.

“Mom, please not the closet,” a child cried

Memories are hard to erase, for they are what we have become and we cannot be denied our identity.

An empty heart

For me the kitchen is where one finds the heart of a home. Neglected and without love, it is nothing more than a room within a house. A house to be considered a home, it most provide a place of safety and nurtured tenderness.

With memories striped bare, stolen innocence still cannot forget

You can empty a room and remove all traces of a former life and identity, yet the memories still remain.

Paint cannot hide the wounds

Pealing away the many layers that have hidden the cruelty not only exposes the ugly secret. it also begins the healing process for the victim.

Leave through many doors to find yourself

By walking through a door and entering a room, we are confined and confronted by the  walls, by the space within and the impressions of others. 

To regain out identity, to discover our full potential and shed the abuse we have suffered, we must leave by many doors.

Lost and found

The series ‘Family Secrets’ comes to a close with ‘Lost and Found,’ but for many people from an abusive childhood, the pain never ends.

In the last few weeks I have relived many memories, gut wrenching and painful at times. The abuse suffered ends with me! It is a promise I made to my dear and lovely children, Armont and Ariana. They will never have to experience the pain and memories of the kind of verbal and mental abuse, or the physical beatings and sexual abuse I endured at the hands of my perpetrator; my mother.

The healing process for any abused person takes a lifetime.

Self portrait with shattered mirror

The only way we can eradicate this evil is to first say to ourselves: “We are not at fault.” All too often we think we are to blame for these conditions, but it is not so. Remember, no love is worth suffering pain and abuse. There is help and you must seek it.

‘Self portrait with shattered mirror’ came about by chance. I had returned to the empty club house, deciding to photograph the hallway, using the mirror in the ladies room. As I was setting up the shot, I looked into the mirror and decided to photograph myself instead.

Postscript

Between April 25 and May 30, 2005, I posted ten photographs at an art community website, Renderosity. It was during this time that I went public for the first time, sharing my childhood memories of abuse and openly confronting my inner demons.

The process of healing has taken twenty-six years, when at the age of thirty-five, I realized that I had not been the problem.

Even though I am doing better today, the wounds and scares still remain, at least I proved stronger and so was able to break the cycle, for my children are now grown adults and were never experienced abuse. However I am sorry that my wife was exposed to my pain these  many years.

What helped my recovery process was that not only coming to terms with what had happened to me, but that seven to eight years ago, I was finally able to forgive my mother and so release the anger that I had harbored against her, which by then had eaten away my spirit like a slow moving illness.

Thank you for your visit

E.A.

Confronting ones challenges

Sooner or later one must confront ones challenges and since this blog after all is anonymous, there is no reason not to, especially after another nail was hammered into the coffin of sadness, drowning under the weight of metal in a lake of tears.

After attended my wife’s relative wedding this last Saturday, I had some time to reflect one the commitments one makes to each other and what is an acceptable price to pay before challenging any of the vows agreed up years later. For one enters into marriage with ignorance and blind faith, since love is an abstract concept with many different interpretations few agree upon.

Pointing the finger and placing all the blame upon ones spouse is not something I am going to do, marriage after all is a work in progress and each one of us no doubt will have something to say about the other that bothers them. However when one partner decides they no longer wish to have any physical relations with them, then what? Since this decision did not occur overnight, a little background information is needed. 

The years in which we tried having children, the sex was wonderful but after the second and last child was born, there was a time of abstinence to which I agreed before we resumed physical relations. They were far in between, no more than five times and no less than twice a year for the next decade and a half. It was more like a drought but I made due, feeling like a vehicle kept going by fumes alone, especially since also lacking was any emotionally physical closeness of the non-sexual kind. It seems she does not require hugs, cuddling, holding or touching that brings two people closer over the years. One could say she is completely self-sufficient individual, whereas I am not.

I have a need to feel alive, a need to know I am wanted and desired. Allowed to express my sexual urges and reciprocate my partners needs, all that which allows me to be a complete person. For the physical exchange between two persons is the very reason for getting up each morning.

Unfortunately I injured myself in an industrial accident in 2002 and had surgery in 2003, followed by a recovery period of more than four years, during which I was diagnosed with cancer. A few months later my wife began her menopause period and she decided not to undergo a hormone treatment as this can cause breast cancer, a decision I fully supported.

A year later I had a heart attack and the next month, January of 2006, I under went a triple by-pass open heart surgery. The recovery went as expected including a few years of serious depression, including the failure of one of the grafts eighteen months later, I survived and for what if only to be denied one of the reasons for living.

Yet as these passing months turned into years, during which I sought some physical connection with her, only to be rebuffed. So now I am raising the question, do I have a right to seek physical closeness  and sexual gratification elsewhere? Let’s keep in mind that I also have been warned by her that if I do, there would be consequences and I would be kicked out of the house. It is as though I am being kept a prisoner while she is having her cake and eating it to.

I cannot just turn off having any emotional and physical needs and to do without them. I am too alive and enjoy life and though my creating art has helped me through some of the rough bumps, I personally cannot continue life without ever experiencing the pleasures of the flesh—why should I be forced to?

So upon our return from the wedding, where we both had a good time, I wanted to fool-around, express my affections and yes, possible even masturbate in order to release any pressures. Unfortunately all this was met with a negative response that was more like ‘disgusting’ or ‘give me a break,’ rather than sharing some tenderness even thought there would be no sexual intercourse. She chose to read her book and I reluctantly went to sleep.

My art has sustained me, permitted me to continue but it does not feed the needs of the flesh or the longings of a gentle feminine touch caressing my skin. I cannot continue to live this way or meet my day of judgement without living once again.

With my cards now exposed, I declare I am open to receiving another woman’s affections which would be equally reciprocated, searching for an affair of the heart, an affair of the flesh.

Thank you for your visit

E.A.

A gift

Upon retrieving the mail, I held in my hands a small, almost square package from a person who’s name or address was unfamiliar. It was a book about heart shaped stones and only after reading the accompanying enclosed letter, did I realized it came from a person I met April 4th at Bean Hollow State Park beach, which lies between San Francisco and Santa Cruz.

The Gift

Her name is Elizabeth and she was traveling down along the Pacific coast taking photographs of the scenery. We struck up a conversation and after an introduction I told her that a little further south was Whitehouse Cliff trail that leads to a cove I have considered my pirates/smugglers cove, my place to escape to. The place I discovered my first  two heart shaped stones during a storm.

Deep down inside me I wanted to share that spot with her, since it was a public spot, but that was not to be. During the course of taking pictures, Elizabeth called out to me and gestured I come to her, for she had discovered a heart shaped opening in the rock formation. Elizabeth continued photographing the varied stone structures as did I and before I left, giving her the name of my web site that she wrote down in her notebook.

From my collection

When I learned the gift came from her, three months after our initial contact and that she remembered how personally important heart shaped stones are to me, I was deeply touched by her kindness, especially as her correspondence contained some sad news, the kind we all face at one point or another.

The brief hour we shared at a public beach, each fulfilling our creative vision, while sharing a conversation, has now become a permanent memory through the gift. Maybe our paths will cross again and we meet once more, for it would be something I would look forward to with pleasure.

Thank you Elizabeth for brightening my day.

Thank you for your visit

E.A.

Facing the truth

For weeks now I have been looking in the mirror and telling myself that I have not addressed the issue that was the reason for the blog and questioning when it will be that I break through the glass ceiling. However talking about matters one would refer to as very personally and making them public is still a huge hurdle to over come, besides how I to word the complexity that dwells within. Just blurting it out is just not my style and in the meantime the cauldron is boiling over. 

Since the beginning of 2003, obstacles have cropped up all around, navigating from one health issue to another, all of which have left their mark upon my body like some road map that someday might be traverse by the hand of my lover. 

She who remains unidentified except for when tensions need a release and she takes on the face of hundreds as images cycle through on the monitor. Yet this temporary reality has become more of a permanent situation as my partner for life has decided that any physical connection is no longer desired or wanted, while postings earlier in the year to CL bulletin board a request for a woman who to is seeking lover have remained unanswered.

In the meantime I continue to focus on my art and to develop a collection which would then be displayed in a gallery, generating a few sales, despite the current economic situation. For now it is the only thing that fills my heart with any kind of personal satisfaction and though it seems the only thing I live for, I continue yearning for the touch of another.

Thank you for your visit

E.A.

Holocaust Remembrance Day

Saturday, April 30 at sunset, according to the Jewish calendar was the beginning of the observation of 2011 Holocaust Remembrance Day, while officially on Sunday, May 1, it was observed by all others. In light of this somber reflection I wish to share a painting I completed in May 2008 in response to the ‘German Question’ and my thoughts about the Holocaust.

Remembrance, May 2008

MM/C 24 x 24” inches

During the process of this painting it was first known as “The German Question,” upon the completion the painting was named “Remembrance.” Briefly I had considered “Absence of History,” a title my son had suggested and a title I am reserving for another canvas.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum - frequently asked questions

The next Holocaust Remembrance Day will begin at sunset on April 18, 2012 for the Jewish people and observed by others on Thursday, April 19.

Thank you for your visit

E.A.