Life in Water Color

 

Eva Tebbutt
7 June 2018

Watercolor. From the vibrant and striking blue, to the pale and sheer rose, watercolor has always been my favorite type of painting. Every time I take my brush and lay it out on the paper, the color instantly starts to spread, covering, and staining the paper. It rushes out quick, like a stream, and I can use that to paint whatever is on my mind.

Sometimes though, I’ll make a mistake, or I add too much water to the color, and I’ll create a hole in the paper. The easiest, and most logical, thing to do would obviously be to just start over; begin again. Starting over is what many, or all people, do at some point in their lives. Like starting again on a painting, a recipe, or even on a friendship.

As an artist, it’s easy, and sometimes liberating, to start again, to give myself and my artwork a second chance. In fact, I do that so often that I don’t keep track on it anymore. Instead, I keep track on the one single thing I didn’t give a second chance to. My father.

My father divorced from my mother when I was at the young and impressionable age of four. I don’t really remember much of what happened, since it was ten years ago, but what I do remember is that he was the one that ended the marriage. It broke my mother’s heart, and  I will never forgive him for it.

The divorce was extremely toxic, my mother really never got over it; even to this day. So I never really got the full picture of what really happened. However, there were some occasions when I did get to hear what my father was really like. He would always wear a vermillion blazer everywhere he went. My mother also said that he always had a quiet, yet charming way about him, which he displayed until a couple years into their marriage. And it was sometime after my father, at least started to feel unhappy, and wanted a divorce. The last thing on my mother’s mind was a divorce, and it shocked her, especially since she loved him dearly.

The last fact that I know about him, and probably the most devastating one to me, is that he never loved me. Not at all. From the little knowledge that I have, he never wanted a child, and I seemed to be a big factor that contributed to him leaving us.

Knowing this, and having this guilt inside me for ten years is not easy to deal with. There have been relatives that I have even spoken to. And all of them just say the same thing.“Oh Halle, it’s not your fault. Your father’s decision was based solely on his and your mother’s relationship.” But that is far from the truth. I now know this, but the way that I found out was tough. It started one day in first grade. By then the divorce had already transpired. And I remember Millie, one of my friends, who still remains my friend to this day, had invited me to her house, and once I got there I was confused as to why both of her parents lived in the same house.

At first, it was just that one moment at Millie’s house that I minded, but then it became a pattern. I only had one parent at birthday parties, and school plays, and to tuck me in at night. The fact that my father never reached out to me, his own daughter, came crashing down on me like a rainstorm that never seemed to end. And eventually, thunder and then lightening got added to the rainstorm, and my relationship, and feelings towards my father plummeted as I found out more and more of the truth. The truth being that he never loved me.  

As hard as it is to deal with this, I know that life will go on, and so the best thing I should do is to accept it. And so that’s what I do. I know how unfortunate it is, so I choose to highlight the happy, and the good parts about my life.

This had been my life until today. June, 14, 1964. The 14th of June has always been an ordinary summer day for me. A free day. In my past years I painted, or went to the drugstore at the corner with a few of my friends.

Remembering all of these fun memories, brings the rush and excitement of summer back into my head, so I head right for the stairs to head outside.

I was about to go down the stairs when something caught me off guard. My mother’s door was closed. She never closed her door ever. In fact, I don’t even think that I had ever seen her door closed until today. We never talked about why she kept the door open, and there really was never a logical reason, but I had just grown so accustomed to it being open, that I knew something was wrong with my mother for the door to be shut.

I slowly saunter up to the door. I give a very light knock, and get no response. I put my ear to the door and hear faint crying. It was unmistakably my mother’s cry.

“Mom?” I yell through the door.

“Halle, now is not a good time to talk.” My mother replies in between sobs

“Mom, please tell me what is wrong!” I plead. I really did want to know. My mother is a very fragile, and sensitive person, but also one of the kindest, and caring. So I try my best to return the favor. I wait about two minutes, then her door creaks open. By now, she has stopped crying a little bit. She takes a deep breathe.

“Why don’t you come in.” She says to me. I walk in, unsure of what’s going to happen. I just hope that it’s nothing bad. She sits on her bed, and motions for me to do the same. As I sit down she takes a deep sigh.

“Today is your father’s birthday.” My eyes widen. My father’s birthday?

“How come I didn’t know this before?” I ask.

“Because I didn’t want you getting anymore hurt than you already are. I just know that the more information you find out, the more it affects you.” I think about what she is telling me. How it affects me. This confirms my suspicion about my father not loving me. But I decide to discuss this issue with my mother now because she barely ever speaks about him. But since we are already on the topic, I just decide to ask her about the information I need to know.

“Mom, did dad ever  love me?” I ask

“Well what do you mean?” She asks.

“Did he ever want a child, and did he ever show any signs of affection when I was a kid?” I ask.

“Here’s the thing, Halle. I can tell you what I think, or what actually happened.” The sound of that intrigues me. what actually happened.

“Tell me both.” I said.

“Okay well, he never did want a child. And he never did act like he loved you. But here’s what I think, and what I know is true. He really did love you, but we were just at a really bad point in our marriage at the time.” She said.

“Oh okay.” I say, stunned, my heart beating rapidly.

“Well thanks for telling me.” I said. I quickly got up, and bolted for my room.

Once I am in there I slam my door shut and start to bawl my eyes out. I don’t really know why because I always knew that my father hated me, but it was just devastating hearing it from my own mother. Hearing that felt like a knife to my heart, another stab to add to all the other breaks that I had received throughout the years. It didn’t matter what my mother said though. Because I knew the truth. My father hates me, and there is nothing anyone can do about it.

I sit on my bed for a while with that thought in my mind, but then I remember how I need to highlight the good parts in my life. So that’s exactly what I decide to do. I need to be happy and grateful for what I have instead of what I wish I had.

I know both my mom and I are in a down mood so I walk over to her room where I propose an idea.

“Hey, do you want to maybe put together a puzzle?” I asked. My mother and I used to do puzzles all the the time when I was younger. She never liked them, but I did, and even though after our one hundredth puzzle, she still said that she didn’t like them. I knew she was just saying that, and I hoped that she had grown to like them as well.

“Oh! You haven’t asked to do a puzzle since you were ten. Sure that sounds like fun,” my mother answered. “Most of them are up in the attic if you want to get them. I think they would be on the top shelf to your left,” she added.

“Ok I’ll go get one. I’ll meet you downstairs.” I said.

Truthfully, I never had really been in the attic before, and I was actually kind of excited to explore it, to see all of the hidden treasures, and objects that hadn’t been opened in years. I walk into my room, and there is a little staircase leading to the attic door. I march up the stairs, and grab a hold of the doorknob. I use a little bit of force to push open the door. I open it wider, I slowly walk in with my flashlight, and take in my surroundings.

There are boxes everywhere. Some are on shelves, but most are on the ground, stacked up. I walk over to the shelf that holds the puzzles. As I walk, I hear the floorboards creak obnoxiously. I make my way over to the shelf, and locate the box. I am about to bring it down, but I decide to explore a little more first. I walk across the attic, and find a box labeled CD’s. I decide I will open it, and dabble about the various CD’s stored inside. The CD box is the third box in a stack, so I take off the first box labeled BED SHEETS, and just as I am about to take off the second box I stop dead in my motion. It is labeled DAVID C. MILLER. That is my father’s name.

Eagerly, I open up the box, hoping to find more answers about my father. I am not hoping to redeem my feelings about him since I already know how horrible he is. Mostly, trying to figure out what his interests were, or his hobbies. I shine my light inside the box to see its contents better. I first pull out a picture of me as a baby. I looked to be two months old. I was curled up in a purple blanket with the name “Halle” embroidered across it. My head was peeking out from the blanket, and you could see me smile as I slept. The next thing I take out is a big piece of canvas paper. I shine my light on it, and then it all becomes a bit too much for me to take in. It was the same picture of me as a baby, but someone painted it with watercolor paints. My favorite kind. I look to the bottom left, and I see it. My father’s signature: David C. Miller. I take out more paintings, until I empty the box. All of the contents are pictures that my own father had painted of me, and all of them are watercolor. As I look at all of them, the memories, the real, and core memories I have of my father come flooding back to me.

There’s a painting where I’m holding a fish, and smiling proudly. I remember that my family had gone camping, and I fished with my father using an old bamboo fishing pole. That had been the day I caught my very first fish. There is another picture of me holding a rag doll, which I had named Peaches. The last photo he had painted was of me looking out the window, tired, and almost asleep.

Looking at all of these watercolors make my memories, my good memories with my father come back. And then I realize that my father did these portraits of me. Of his daughter. I let that thought sink in, then I start to cry, not really tears of sadness, or happiness, just of extreme emotion. what affects me the most about the paintings is that they were in watercolor. My favorite way to paint.

Quickly after, I hear my mom start to come up the steps.

“Halle? Are you alright in here?” She asks. But I don’t answer because I am too caught up in letting this new discovery sink in. My mother eventually makes it up the stairs to me, and she gasps as she sees all of the pictures and paintings as well.

“Halle what is all of this?” She asks me. I take a deep breath in an attempt to stop crying.

“I- I just found these. I didn’t know dad was a painter, or that he painted pictures of me.” I say

“Neither did I!” My mother exclaimed.

“Why do you think he painted these pictures of me?” I ask. My mother laughs a bit.

“Because Halle, it’s like I said, he loved you.”

My father loved me? That thought had have occurred to me, but now, seeing all of these makes me realize that thought may actually be fact. I misjudged him, and it was in that moment that I realized the real truth, not the conclusion that I had come up with, but the plain and simple truth: my father loves me.

While I am still in the moment, I decide to take a chance.

“Mom? Is there any way I can call him?” I ask.

“Are you sure you really want to do that?” She replies.

“Yes, I think I may have misjudged him, and I do really want to find out more about him.”

 

“Alright, his number is in the phone book.” I nod my head, and leave the attic. I make my way into the kitchen, and grab the phone. I slowly dial the number on our big black rotary telephone. I hear two rings and he picks up.

“Hello?” I hear him say.

“H – hey dad, it’s me, Halle. I was wondering if you maybe wanted to see a movie with me today?”