BECOMING A NOTNING.

When I was five years old I was sent to Woolston School. Every morning I walked down our long driveway, turned right into Tilford Street, crossed busy Ferry Road, walked past the park and turned left at the old stone gates to the old stone school. My older brother was already ahead of me there.

My father bought me a suitcase to carry my stuff in.

It was, and still is a horrible case. No doubt he got it cheap not wishing to waste the lord’s money on something as minor as his daughter’s school needs. He despised human feelings and the thought of my embarrassment at such a deviation from the school norm didn’t worry him.

It is not a child’s school case; more like a makeup or small green travelling case.

I hated it from the moment I saw it. It was completely different to anything the other children had.

I was very upset at being made to use it. This may have been the first time my young self understood that my father would take no notice of me, rejecting my wants and feelings on anything, laughing off my embarrassment. His attitude hurt me.

I did not understand then where my father’s priorities lay. He wasn’t interested in pleasing me. To him my feelings were irrelevant. It was only God that mattered. He thought that having human feelings didn’t bring glory to god. God was his first love and I was only a mere child whose feelings didn’t matter, did they?

What right did I have to protest? He wanted me to think about god’s feelings and not my own. His thoughts were distorted and when he acted like this he hurt a lot of people’s feelings.

I understand now that I still had some human feelings at only five years old. I HAD NOT QUITE BEEN DEHUMANISED YET, but he was working on me. He brushed aside my protests and, as usual, treated my feelings as unimportant.

My father was dehumanized by his chosen religion; his thinking was only about denying self and being pleasing to god and if that meant hurt feelings for me then that was inconsequential. I could expect a lot more of that treatment as I grew older, and my father continued to treat me as a nothing. Feelings were of no consequence.

I am seventy two now and have worked hard to understand the effects of my father’s cult beliefs and how my life has been damaged, and my thinking distorted by his actions and attitude. Recently I WAS LOOKING IN THE GARAGE AND UNEXPECTEDLY SAW THAT WRETCHED green CASE.

That glimpse brought my long submerged bad feelings and memories to the surface again.

I am glad that I can now understand why he behaved in such an unfeeling, dehumanising way towards me. Understanding enables me to accept the old pain of it all.

The Recovering Artist.

Painting into the emotion of my experiences in the cult I was raised from birth in has helped to bring emotional healing and clarity to me as I seek ongoing recovery from my abusive restrictive former existence.

I was not able to begin to consider painting anything until I left the cult after 43 years of submission and obedience where the practise of art was considered a waste of god’s time, and something not to be pursued or tolerated.

I am now a self-motivated artist who has benefitted from being a member of several amateur art groups. I observe and learn from others, but am always filtering and interpreting my art though my own life experience. My current mentor has been particularly helpful in guiding and letting me develop my style in my own way. Quite often I am surprised at what I paint but I understand the wisdom that is coming from within.

I paint my own ideas from my own pain and this often enables reflection and abstract interpretation of the memories and emotional experiences forced on me by my father and others who were leaders in this cult system of religion.

The Recovering Artist.

Becoming an Artist