Eight works in progress.

From Wednesday (of this week).

jean for Tao Yu

shirts for Paulette

Being everyone. (One.)

I feel like screaming. This will be a post I do not edit. I am not going to delete a word because if I start- I will not stop- I know that much for sure by now. I am on this insane ... no, it is more like a sane trip- out from the self imprisonment of my dissociative disorder. If I had to sum up the entire good and bad and scary and strange and painful and on and on and on and on... experience I would say this: IT HURTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It HURTS. IT HURTS. IT HURTS.
Yesterday I had therapy and my therapist helped me with some big things where I have been feeling 'stuck'. Am I grateful to be 'unstuck'? No. Not really. Almost not at all, in fact. IT HURTS TO BE REAL. A couple of nights ago I was laying in bed just touching my thigh with one finger and pressing just enough to feel the bone in my leg and my mind was going off in five or sex or seven or eight different directions and trying to run but I just kept thinking, "I am real." And I look at the skeleton and then at another person and I touch my own leg in bed at nights sometimes but just with one finger and it is almost one finger too much for me. I do not really feel my own skin or body- I mean- I separate myself and I can pinch myself and not feel anything at all. I think I cut myself in the past because I wanted to say I was hurting but maybe also because I wanted to really FEEL the hurt and it is very hard for me to feel. My mind is going off in so many different directions - or trying to but of course there is no where but here.
I keep realizing more and more and again and again: I have so many different ways of thinking. And: I have to work to remind myself of the year. OF THE YEAR. I HAVE TO REMIND MYSELF OF THE YEAR.
I have recently realized that there is a part... more than one actually, that feels like every single day that I am in danger of being hurt (raped, beaten, kicked, screamed at) by my father. I AM SCARED EVERY DAY. I AM THOUSANDS OF MILES AWAY FROM HIM, LIVING ON a fucking island and I am terrified.
I wish the past was concrete and I could beat it into a million pieces with a hammer. But I guess I already tried that with my mind and now I am trying to glue the entire system back to working in sync again.
Today I drew all day but I am not posting images of anything here because there is a HUGE part of me that wishes I had just stayed in bed. HIDDEN. If not from the past: the present. The present is good, but incredibly painful. Drawing every day is wonderful and also it feels like it is moving EVERYTHING IN MY HEAD WHICH I HAVE WORKED ALWAYS NEVER TO EVEN TOUCH LET ALONE MOVE.
This morning I found out that a woman whose blog I sometimes read committed suicide a month ago. And there is another woman whose blog I read and I read today that she attempted to kill herself a week ago. After I read about both of those women I put my computer away and started drawing.
Someone has to be strong and tell their story of abuse and go on and recover and be an example and prove it can be done even when/if it feels totally and completely impossible. I feel mad today that this is what I have to do- that I have to spend so much time and work so hard to try to recover from what another human and the person who was supposed to take care of me did. I almost always feel mixed up about why I am evening TRYING to go on. Spite? Rage? A very strong will to live? All of those things and a thousand more reasons.
I want to draw and I want to draw all of the time and I BELIEVE that I am going to draw my way right out through the rest of this mess of such shit and pain that is leftover from my father's abuse. I AM GOING TO KEEP GOING. I am going to draw when I feel bad and even when I feel like I can not draw anymore.
I want to erase everything here, but I won't. My mind... my mind and the past and the present and.... IT HURTS.

*NOTE: I just wrote all of the above and then, in my effort to try to help myself understand and know better my own mind- I decided I would actually READ my own writing for once instead of just walking away. I got all the way to the part that reads: "my mind was going off in five or sex or seven.....". Ok. Never mind the read through I just mentioned.

Five or sex or seven. HA!

THIS HURTS.

Five or sex or seven. EXACTLY.

p.s.- Now I REALLY want to delete all of this- but I am not going to. I am going to leave it here because I have to believe that it is somehow good and helpful; for me, maybe other people- but I have to believe I will get through this and start feeling better.

Third (and final) test drawing.

Here is a picture of the drawing in progress:And here is the final version:

Self?

photo before leaving

t-shirt I finished today.

Brontosaurus for S.O., jeans in progress, the day and the air I breathe.

Today I mostly worked on the right leg of the jeans in the photo. And I made the third dino t-shirt too. I wanted to see them all together then, so I hung them up there and decided I had to take a photo. :-)
This morning I was drawing and I knew there were people at the foundation but I was not paying a lot of attention. I left my work room for something and was totally shocked when I walked into a room and Paola Buziol was standing there. She asked me in Italian, "How are you?" but I was so surprised (I have seen her once before but never spoken to her)- I was so surprised that I just shook my head and she asked me again (but in English), "How are you?" She was incredibly kind and shook my hand. A few minutes later she came into the room where I was working and I showed her the clothes I have been working on and then the wall drawing too. She seemed to like it and said a couple of very nice things.
I also had my therapy today and it was good but hard. I told my doctor that yesterday I drew a lot and last night I was feeling pretty happy and I was doing the dishes after I had eaten dinner and I suddenly thought to myself, "Make a list of all of the things he (my father) can not take away from you now- things I am thankful for." And without even a pause between the question and the answer my very first thought was this: The air that I breathe.
It is painful, but I know I am healing more and more every day.
Oh... One other great thing from today. I have really been wanting to ask if I could have a sewing machine. Today I finally decided just to ask and: It is going to happen.
Wonderful wonderful. Hard, but great.

Multiple, multiple, multiple me.

I just had my therapy. Now I am going to draw, then go back to the apartment and discuss the whole situation with my other doctor; Dr. Larry Lloyd.

SAM SAM (couture)

Happy New Year.

To celebrate the first day of the Chinese New Year (which is tomorrow) Tao Yu and I went out for lunch at a Chinese restaurant here in Venice. Our apartment is very close to the Rialto bridge and we found this restaurant just on the other side. After I took this picture I told Tao Yu that she is going to kill me with her happiness. :) She is happy a lot. This is of course good; just slightly different from my usually mood of "ok/I don't know/angry/sad/confused/ok/what?". Anyway- I love this picture. And the lunch was really good. Now we are both back at the apartment and working.

Here is a picture I took from the Rialto bridge on our way back to the apartment.

It is incredible to be living here. It is SO beautiful.

Finished.

Here is a photo of the first two drawings that are finished. "Shirt for never sleeping" and "camicia per l'ospedale (shirt for the hospital)".

And here is a photo of the ceiling of my work room at the foundation.

This is my 700th post!!! (A couple of images.)

Here is a picture of the room where I work.

And I realized today that I never posted an image of my second 'test' drawing that I made on the wall. So here it is. I am going to take it down this week and cover it with paper once more. I will make one more 'test' drawing while the final adjustments are made for the lights and video. Then I will take that paper off and start working on the ACTUAL wall. :-)

'Making is the mirror in which we see ourselves'. -Frank Bidart

I have not been writing very much here lately... Both a mix of being busy and then just avoidance. The truth can be so painful to bear...
Right now it is 7:20 Pm in Venice and in 40 minutes I will have therapy with my doctor over Skype. I have been dreading it all day. I think it is somewhat humorous how much I say that- "dreading my therapy"... It is never really the therapy that I dread... it is WHAT COMES OUT in my therapy that I feel is so hard to manage. I am reading a book of poems and that is where I got the title line for this post by Frank Bidart. The day after I read that line I came to the foundation and drew and wrote all over a long sleeved t-shirt about having lost two babies; about having two abortions. I have 4 shirts and 5 or 6 pairs of jeans that I am drawing on right now and that t-shirt- with the image of two little babies in wombs- it just tortures me and I keep putting it behind all of the other clothes I am drawing on.
It has seemed hard to write here- to keep up blogging about everyday stuff when everyday stuff has been so strange... for example: living in Venice. But drawing all day, the images I make and the amount of hours I am spending working... it is a lot and I feel like I need to write about all of this weird and wonderful experience because it very much is both.
Yesterday I had to take Lloyd to a vet here because he has an infection around one of his teeth. Taking him was no small job. First Stefano had to call and find a place for me to go... I was worried and nervous and I have been just incredibly anxious anyway- so Lloyd having a problem with his mouth just about was too much to deal with... or so it felt for 'a part of me' yesterday. Anyway- after Stefano located a vet not too far from my apartment I went and put a collar and harness and a leash on Lloyd and wrapped him up in a huge baby blanket and set off for the vet. I carried him down the four flights of stairs of my apartment and decided I would never make it there by myself... so I called my roommate who was kind enough to come with us. I had to carry my 18.25 lb Lloydy, hold and umbrella and a map to navigate the streets of Venice. Tao Yu met us and then I just had to manage my 'little' Lloyd... she held the umbrella and the map. Anyway- we got there and the vet said it was just an infection so now Lloyd has an antibiotic that he will take for a week and a little gel to put on his sore tooth. I got back to the foundation just in time to catch the inauguration.
The point is this: The whole thing with Lloyd was hard. It seemed very overwhelming to me yesterday; but a lot of things overwhelm me right now, so that is not much of a surprise. It is more that things seem hard- I mean- I am trying to be here, work on these two projects, take 'o.k.' care of myself and Lloyd and Winston, do my therapy and just be 'ok'. It is a lot. And it is a lot because the whole experience of being an artist in residence is pretty great, but that also causes a lot of problems for the part of my body and mind that have been using the whole 'I am going to hide in bed or in front of the tv or cut myself or binge on food' trick(s) of trying to avoid both the present, the idea of the future and just about everything having to do with the past.
So here I am in Venice, Italy, 31 years old and today... almost everything is enough to make me cry. I want to throw that t-shirt about the two lost babies into a trash can... but I have tried that trick too and it doesn't do a damn bit of good.
I will try to write more here again. Soon.

OH HAPPY DAY. Happy inauguration day!!! :)

It is just barely 5 AM in Washington D.C. and every train of the Metro is delayed because there are SO MANY PEOPLE!!!!!! :-) They are expecting TWO MILLION people or more to be there. I love it. I will be watching it live on-line.
I LOVE IT!!!!!!

weekend.

Day 5. (Only my second day of drawing on the clothes though.)

Nothing is finished yet or maybe... I don't know. Anyway- the shirt is titled "camicia per l'ospedale (shirt for the hospital)". I love being here.

Starting. (Drawing on jeans.)

The model above is my roommate; composer Tao Yu. :)

I am just getting started. These are just the first couple of things I have begun.

3rd day of my project in Venice.

Today I removed the drawing I did yesterday and covered the wall with new paper. I will try to post pictures of the latest 'test drawing' tomorrow or the next day. Today I also started drawing on jeans.

HERE WE GO. (Here I am.)

Ok... The wall was put together yesterday and today I covered it with paper and made a drawing that I worked on for thirty minutes. The above image is taken from the very end of the video... when I am almost done working. Tomorrow I will take the drawing down, put up new paper and do another drawing. The wall is 26'2" x 4'9" (1.5 x 8 meters). Click on the image to see it in a better way.

Walls. (Going up and coming down.)

This is a photo of the wall that I will draw on. They are building it today.
And below is a picture I took from my apartment this morning.

Lloyd and Winston are completely excited to be living in Venice.

Quick update...

Ok... Sorry for the lack of blogging. I have been busy and getting ready to go to Venice. Yesterday Stefano and I went just for one night and then came back. Saturday we will move the rest of my stuff there and take Lloyd and Winston. I will blog from Venezia. See you soon! (Below are a few quick pictures we took this morning. It snowed there.)

In Rome, on the way to Florence, birthday card for Stefano's sister.

Addendum. (For the previous post.)

Here is one of the many great paintings we saw at the Uffizi. It is by Botticelli and titled, "The Return of Judith".

I just wanted to come back and write one more thing and post this image. I just wanted to say that even though I am in a huge amount of pain when I think about my past and about all of the horrible things that my father did to me- I am still going forward. Always. He hurt me, but I am recovering. He hurt me in every way he could think of but he did not kill me; he just forced me to always be stronger.

And in a week I will be in VENICE!!!!! :-)

And p.s.- I just ate an Italian cookie that was soooo SO good... it made me happy I am still alive. ;-)

On being beaten. (WARNING: This post may be VERY VERY triggering.)

I am in Italy, at Stefano's computer while he is out walking Apple. I had a very bad nightmare last night and then we came here to walk Apple, but I decided to stay here and email my doctor instead of going out for a walk. I began an email to him that was like a lot of messages I have written- confused, jumping around, switching thoughts and topics and ideas and then not. After a while of jumping around and letting my thoughts be chaotic enough to mask the most painful one or ones I start to 'get clear'. And I start writing to him about how much my skin is bothering me. But then even more clear than that... I start to write about how clear the past is becoming to me- about how I feel like I am being stoned to death by the pain of the truth- by the pain of knowing about what my dad did. I write to my therapist about how much it hurts to know now what I have always known but have blocked out because it felt intolerable. This seems like a good place to focus- the fact that it was ONCE - or AT ONE TIME- that it felt impossible. My doctor has said many times that my mind could not tolerate the knowing before but my mind can tolerate it now and so it does. I mean: I blocked it out and now I am unblocking it. I have spent five years in therapy working on this mess of what my dad did to me- I lived for 26 years unable to tolerate knowing about any of it- or a mix of that and a lack of somebody to help me learn how to begin to really know what I always knew. Anyway- I think I have to remember now and over and over and over again that my mind would not be putting forth this mess of painful memories if I did not feel in some way that it was tolerable.
I was writing to my doctor about feeling like I was being 'beaten by the pain of the truth'... and then realizing that feeling... the one of being beaten- that is a memory too. One I (OF COURSE) wish I was without and not just 'without'... but I wish it had (OF COURSE) never happened. I do not want it to be true that when I was little, when I was young, when I was a teenager and as a young adult... that my father abused me in LITERALLY every imaginable way.
I am crying now and it is hard to type, but I am so aching to get these words thoughts feelings ideas out of me...
I DO NOT WANT any of this to be true. I ALWAYS imagine going back in time and having a chance to have a different family, a different 'dad', a different 'life'. Then I start thinking what a waste it is to think that way... I mean... I understand now (and of course) my own incredibly huge wishful thinking. It is just that I USED MAGICAL THINKING ALL OF MY LIFE TO PROTECT MYSELF and now it just does not help me anymore.

I do feel like it is indeed the truth that sets me free. But I also feel like the truth is painful in a way that is almost too big to describe. ALMOST. Almost impossible to describe, but not really impossible at all.

I remember my father raping me. I see him walking into my bedroom at night, I remember the feeling of the bed as it sinks with his weight when he sits down on it. I remember the feeling of the bed as it sinks with his weight when he sits down on it. And what happens next.... I want to cut it out of my head; out of my thoughts.

He pulls back the bed covers. Goodbye blanket. Goodbye imagined safety. Goodbye sheet.

And then I am just there and with nothing between me and him but the pajamas I was wearing. And my father, my father who never did anything for me- never drove me to school, never took me to a doctor's appointment, never took care of me in anyway- my father undresses me. He pealed me hundreds of times in my life. Hundreds and hundreds. He would have to take of my clothes because I would not move.

(I keep stopping as I type this- crying or putting my head in hands as though I can not go on... and then I do.)

So my father used to come into my room at night, take my blankets off of me (with a small fight over that from me.... I used to hold them so tight I could feel all of my fingers through the stack of blankets and sheets I had used to try to mummify myself with)- he would fight me to remove those covers (but not too much of a fight because I was 1. totally scared of getting him mad and 2. because I was just a child and I could not have fought in a physically stronger way if I tried even. So he would remove the blankets and then my pajamas. He would take of my shorts and underwear and push my shirt up......

That is it for now. I do not want to write anything more about it right now.

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Stefano and I had a good trip to Florence. We saw a lot of great things and heard a concert on New Year's Eve.

My project in Venice will begin Monday, January 12, 2009.