Psychology is what has been on my mind for a while. I’ve been thinking about my fears. Most of them consist of deeper, metaphorical dreams. For instance, I’ve been wary on scuba diving or swimming in a large and deep ocean such as the pacific in which I cannot see the bottom only blue abyss. Then my other fears have come out of past scares. A boy once jabbed at me with a cutter. Ever since I have had nightmares and seen various occasions involving a type of cutting utensil being stabbed into me or someone in particular.

My greatest fear which I have come to realize is one that freezes me in my tracks. My blood runs cold, and I suddenly have a wave of memories crash around my brain. I can’t help but to relive eight years of my life over again in eight seconds. I stop and stutter. I can’t help but look at my shoes and hear my heart in my ears. A sort of panic attack overwhelms me. That fear would be the simple setting of a male shouting loudly in anger and cursing, and sometimes even throwing over objects and crashing things against the wall or other nearby solid materials.

I’ve never really felt afraid until I experienced those eight years of hell. I guess in some ways it wasn’t as bad as what my mother had to go through. I was at most though ashamed. I hated to go into public with his foul temper that could explode anytime. I was afraid to be the topper that topples the first domino in a sequence of wild and self absorbed behavior. I could see when he would be out of control. His knuckles turning white while gripping the steering wheel. His hunched shaking. His bloodshot eyes. Cursing, swaggering, and suspicious activity; but most of all, his entire imaginative mind.

For ever since I was born, I have tried to please the stranger my father. I tried to make him happy while he was angry. He was never sad. I promised things I knew I would never be able to do, or was wrong. I tried. It was not enough and I never gave up until a revelation, an epiphany hit me. I’m sorry to have wasted all those years.

After he left I celebrated the very first day I felt the thick smog lift. I screamed at the top of my lungs at the very top step on the second floor. I was never allowed to do or say anything loudly in fear of his waking from his slumber or screaming at me to be silent. I then ran around the house laughing. Ran outside and hit everything I could that would not feel. That wasn’t alive.

But I took the sudden freedom for granted. I lived in fear anyways at night. I would have nightmares of the shadow of his form appearing under the locked doorway lingering there. The slow agonizing twist of the door knob. It never went farther before I shot out of bed in sweat and a thunderous heartbeat. I couldn’t breathe for fear of his return and change of mind. In the day I would stare out the window wondering if I’d see the red and silver of his truck winding down the driveway and into the garage. I would get up quickly from wherever I would be if I heard any little noise that depicted an engine or the shutting of a car door. Even today, the shutting of a car door alarms me and makes me shoot out of the place I would be resting.

I have fantasies that aren’t pleasant at all that suddenly appear in my mind of the gossip I overheard the Filipino ladies discussing. They say he was a drug dealer. Someone who knew the right people that were snipers or bounty hunters that could track us down and mysteriously take me away or shoot us in cold blood. I would demise my own escape through various situations that I could possibly find myself in such as his showing up in my new home. I don’t dare wish for any of the day mares or nightmares to persist but they still do.

The fashion of getting rid of one’s mental pressures today in the modern world is visiting a shrink. A therapist in proper English. Personally I do not think they would be of the littlest help. I understand my problems; know how and why they exist. The only thing that no one but time knows how to heal is the disappearance of that pain. Medication cannot even help. It would only knock me out and have me addicted to the stable loopy, euphoric mind endorsing medication.

I don’t know what else to do but artistically let out my feelings through what I do best. Poetry, writing, painting, drawing, and thinking relieve me of some stress. This is all I can do. Maybe I can help other abused families. Spread my knowledge. Is it my calling to be like many abused heroes and help others that have been in my situation? I don’t know as of yet. But somehow I will know what I am called to do. If anything at all I’m expressing myself through these words that God has gifted me in. I will continue my writing. Paint pictures through words. If a picture can tell more than a thousand words, then more than a thousand words can paint a canvas. I’m painting my past with white acrylic and starting a new piece that I will be artist to, which I will conduct, lead, and construct.