My Dad was an alcoholic, I can't remember ever seeing him sober, he wasn't there that much when we were kids, though my memories when he was there were odd ones.
I remember the time he brought this dogfish looking thing home in a fish tank and told me he'd bought us a shark, I can't remember what happened to it but I can't imagine it lasted long.
I remember once a kid stole one of my prized marbles and he brought me a brass ball home the size of a melon
.He had a rope ladder in the bedroom because he was scared of fires. He used to open all the windows and doors when there was a thunder storm, even though my mum would be so scared she'd be hiding under the kitchen table, because he said if a fireball came in it would go straight out again, what the heck?
He'd let me sip from his beer, take drags of his cigs from as young as I can remember.
He used to squeeze me too hard, so hard that I couldn't breath and I'd be trying to get him to stop and felt like I was going to die, I was a bit afraid of him but I still loved him as a child does.
He made us stand up when the national anthem came on. He was a drunken idiot.
One time he came home particularly merry and got my younger sister and I out of bed, I can't remember where my mum was, but I imagine she must have been asleep.
My sister had long white blond hair and he got the scissors out and gave her a little crop cut. I remember how crazy my mum went about that the next day, she was crying and everything.
Then he got my sister and I to bring our teddies outside and he hung them all on the washing line. Then he got us to shoot them with an air rifle. This part of my memory is very hazy, I probably blocked it out, my sister remembers it vividly, she probably enjoyed it, she was a little evil.
I remember for a long time afterwards though, when I couldn't sleep at night, I would spend time sticking my fingers into the holes in my teddies and struggling for ages to get the metal pellets out which were embedded in the wadding inside. I remember being angry with him.
He was a drunken idiot, he insulted and upset everyone around him, when I was older around eighteen, he said something stupid to my then girlfriend. I called him an old drunken bastard, he said 'How dare you speak to me like that, I'm your father?!' I said 'You'll never be my father you stupid old twat, I'll knock you out' and people jumped in to calm things down. I was very drunk at the time also, I didn't usually use language or behave like that.
I inherited some of my dad's ways and had my own problems with drink and drugs and didn't fully get a hold of my life until I was in my mid thirties.
Somehow I managed to break those habits though and now lead a very quiet life. I still get very tempted now and then to get reckless and irresponsible, but now I have my art as a focus and that's all I want to do, so the thought of wasting a few days being out of it is just not a nice one at all.
Me ex messaged me a couple of years back and asked me for my address because she wanted to send me something. A few days later I got a package and inside was 'Tiggy' the tiger, seen in this picture. I hadn't seen it years, I didn't know she had it. Now he sits near me while I paint. He still has scars.
Kommentare