I want to write about my new painting Water and Circles. But in order to do so, I have to back up..way back. So, buckle up, curl up, here we go.
First, let me tell you a little bit about my dad and how I remember him. He was far from perfect. Don’t worry - he would agree with that. He had a horrible temper and zero patience. When he was angry, it was probably one of the scariest things you’ll ever see. But he was never that way with me. I think he thought I hung the moon. Don’t get me wrong - I definitely got in trouble, annoyed the shit out of him, and there were times I knew I disappointed him, but he never got truly angry at me.
In fact, I remember him pretending to spank me with a belt as a kid when my brother and I were fighting. He would take me first in one of the back rooms and yelling, counting to three so loudly and dramatically and, then he would quietly giggle and wink at me before he hit the bed with the belt. I would play along and scream and fake cry. (Sorry Robby...he was training me to be an actress!) Don’t get me wrong - my mom gave me plenty of spankings. (Thanks for being tough, Mom.)
Ya see, deep inside, my dad was a teddy bear.
In September of 2010, he got a pain in his neck while he was editing some video. It got worse and worse and just wouldn’t go away, so he told my mom that he was going to try to finish editing, but then thought he might have to go to the ER.
Fast forward a couple of days. I get a call from my mom’s cell, but it was my aunt’s voice who said hello. I instantly knew something was terribly wrong. I was living in Los Angeles at the time. My mom had called a few days before to let me know Dad was in the hospital. She just said his neck was hurting and he was going to get an MRI but nothing serious. Well, the story gets a little blurry right here because we still aren’t sure exactly what happened. At the hospital, they decided, and my dad agreed, to put him under local anesthesia in order to get the MRI done because he didn’t think he could lie there still for that long with the pain he was experiencing. Something happened. After the MRI, he became paralyzed from the neck down. They were hoping that it was just the anesthesia not wearing off, but soon did tests and realized his lungs were frozen. He wouldn’t be able to breathe without life support.
When my aunt called that day, she told me my dad wanted me to come home. She said she bought me a ticket for a plane leaving from LAX in two hours. It didn’t even cross my mind to pack a black dress.
The next 24 hours was the most important day of my life. His final hours, his final minutes, changed my life forever.
A lot happened that day. September 4th, 2010. I remember in the afternoon, my mom still hadn’t eaten, so I made her go try to eat something. It was just me and my ex-husband (my boyfriend at the time) in the room with Dad. He was off and on napping when he suddenly opened his eyes and looked at me urgently. He couldn’t speak because of the breathing tube, so we used an alphabet device that allowed him to spell things out with his eyes. I’ll never forget those words. “I. Need. Out.” I looked at him. I knew what he meant but refused to admit it. I told him I couldn’t take him outside, and we couldn’t take him home yet. He closed his eyes and then looked at the device, again. This time he spelled “D.I.E.” It still instantly brings tears to my eyes. Even just to type it. I shook my head and mouthed no. Then, one of the most important moments of my life occurred. He gave me this look. This look I will never forget. He was trying to tell me it was going to be okay. He was trying to tell me it’s what he wanted. He was trying to tell me to trust him. And then I remember having such an odd thought, one I didn’t completely understand at the time. I thought, it’s like he’s trying to tell me he’s doing this for me.
I called my mom, my siblings, and the rest of my family in Amarillo, and told them to come to the hospital. When we took him off life support, he was surrounded by everyone and we all got to say our final words to him. What a blessing!
Finally, this leads me to my painting, Water and Circles.
That night, my ex-husband had a dream about my dad. He said it felt so real. He said he felt like he was right here with him. I was so jealous. After watching my dad take his last breath, I felt like you could see his soul leaving him. Like not actually see it. But you could. It’s the strangest thing. Impossible to describe. And it made me believe in all sorts of things - like people visiting you in your dreams. To be honest, my dad never really liked him, so I couldn’t understand why he would go to him. But if you knew my ex husband, you knew he was always searching for answers. I begged him to tell me everything. He said my dad grabbed both of his arms and looked at him straight in his eyes and said, “The secret to life...are you listening to me??? The secret to life is water and circles. Water and circles.” And that was it. He woke up. He said he didn’t understand what Dad was trying to say.
I knew immediately.
Water and circles. It’s like when you drop a pebble into a pond and it makes ripples. It’s like he was trying to say that every action or experience leads to something else and then something else. It reminds me of this quote from Marianne Williamson,
“All that you have lived through has taught you what it means to live at all.”
As it turns out, he did do it for me. The worst day of my life led me to move back to Texas, which led me to get married and divorced, which led me to find my David. It led me to change careers and get my education degree which led me to get an art certification, which led me back to my own art.
Most of all, it led me to believe that everything happens for a reason. A good reason.
It led me to believe in good.
Water and Circles, acrylic and oil on canvas.