Doctors did a study of Vietnam veterans with brain injuries and found them to be much more religious and tending toward fundamentalism and orthodoxy than those who did not have brain injuries. They explored further and found that decreased activity in the right parietal lobe is associated with feelings of oneness with the universe. “People with injuries to the right parietal lobe of the brain reported higher levels of spiritual experiences, such as transcendence,” according to Brick Johnstone. The right parietal lobe is associated with visual-spatial perception. I have a unique defect in my brain there. The right side of my brain never developed adult arteries to feed blood to the right parietal, temporal and occipital lobes. I have a single fetal artery from my vertebral artery feeding three fetal arteries each to these lobes. Two of these should be fed from adult arteries from the carotid and only one from the vertebral. They had never seen anything like this at HUP. Consequently, I have had six little strokes in my right parietal lobe as a result of migraines and 50 TIAs. I first heard about this study in a radio interview on NPR with Frank Schaeffer about six years ago, about the same time I was learning about my brain defect.
I have finally concluded that my experience of god was just my right parietal lobe having fun with me. So this is my abstract rendering of it done with a pen cap and a pencil eraser.
The painting is acrylic on 12″ x 12″ stretched canvas.
Price: $120 plus postage.
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This piece was a long time in the making. The core of it has sat as a text on what is my now defunct cellphone since December 17, 2015. It is crude and ridiculous. Diamond sent it to me after we had helped her and her man for over a year in various ways. Among other things, it includes the first and second and only times I have been called a bitch. When I read it, I broke into uproarious laughter. I determined then and there that I had to somehow immortalize this. This was by far the most creative “thank you” I had ever received for helping someone in 30 years of serving among the poor! I showed Tony. He couldn’t believe it. Earlier that evening, we had delivered their belongings back to them that they had stored in our barn since August. Some people just have a hard time saying thank you.
On August 14 Diamond and Rashawn had dropped off five huge garbage bags of their belongings at our barn for safe-keeping and tried to pull a fast one by just assuming they could arrive at our house with their stuff, and move in. They had not asked. They did not even ask for the ride. They just slipped into the back seat of John’s car. John just assumed they must have worked something out with me. They sat silently all the way home from Phila. to our home in Souderton, figuring I wouldn’t have the nerve to turn them away. I was home, because I was ill. When I heard them in the backyard, I lost it.
Tony had never seen me or heard me in such a rage before. I just could not understand the sheer gall at the level of presumption and deception that it took to try to do that. It was not like we didn’t have history. At Memorial Day, she had tried to guilt me into paying for a month’s rent, even though the weather was OK, and we had no money. When I did not pay it, she accused me of driving drunk, (She had seen me have 3 beers all day, several hours before we left to bring them home.) One used to be able to read about our appeal and the story on The King’s Jubilee’s site, before TKJ went out of business.
Over the last two years, as I have had open heart surgery for my aortic valve replacement; and as our house was foreclosed on and auctioned by the sheriff; as I went through three infections in my chest incision and ended up allergic to a ninth antibiotic; almost all of the old supporters and volunteers were silent, invisible, evaporated. with a few notable exceptions. Then I would refer to this glorious text message and have a good laugh. Diamond had really put her heart into it!
When our team was serving food in the park, Tony saw them. They were too embarrassed to come over for food. He called me. I told him to take food to them. He did, and gave them my love.
On the left side of the painting I wrote, “At least she said something. Read Revelations 3:16-18. It’s more than I can say for most of the church people in my life.”
Revelation 3:16-18 So, because you are lukewarm-neither hot nor cold-I am about to spit you out of my mouth. You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see.
So the painting was done in layers. It is the logo of The King’s Jubilee in subdued tones on a 24″ square canvas. Painted over that is the QR Code for the text that Diamond sent me on December 17, 2015. That way, anyone with a smart phone with a QR Code app can read it, but it is not visible to casual observers or children. I thought this was a much better solution than counted cross-stitch. I discussed it with my therapist today. She and I had a good laugh. I said, “When I post this, the shit is probably going to hit the fan.” She said, “So what! That is what good art is supposed to do. It provokes a response.”
I asked her if she didn’t think I was totally off my nut for preserving this text in this way and doing this. She told me, no, quite the contrary. I had taken this ridiculous attack, seen it for what it was, and now turned it into something beautiful.
You’re Welcome.
Painting is 24″ x 24″ acrylic on stretched canvas.
SOLD
The irony here is the first time I shared it at a public showing, the first one to hit it with a QR code reader on a phone was a 9-year-old girl. I heard, “Look at this, daddy.” And I thought, “O shit.” I explained to him. We had a good chuckle. Our next door neighbor, who was visiting the show, stopped by, enjoyed the story, liked the painting, and bought it.
As the title indicates, this is my 5th self-portrait. I did this one using only two colors: Dioxazine Purple and Cadmium Yellow, with a Titanium White border and sometimes mixing them with the Titanium White for shading. The portrait is an accurate portrayal of my current mustache length, glasses and hairstyle. However my skin is never that pale, and I have never quite managed purple for my hair: blue,yes; but not purple.
Painting is acrylic on 12″ x 12″ stretched canvas.
Price: $90 plus postage.
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This is my fourth self portrait. I painted it while everyone was neglecting my carefully set up display at Teich & McColgan Daylily & Hosta Farm last weekend. No one wandered through to see my more than 80 original works for sale at free admission. Once I am dead these works will be worth a mint! Van Gogh and I have much similar stories. We were both prison ministers. We were both disapproved by our older brothers and fathers. We both suffered from severe depressive disorder. The difference is that I don’t let my brother commit me to an insane asylum. I told him to go to hell and stopped talking to him. Vincent Van Gogh painted 46 self portraits before he committed suicide.
I have been painting for 17 months so far. Other artists tell me that I capture the ‘essence’ of my subjects; and that my paintings carry ’emotion’. I just know that I couldn’t do this before I had six strokes and now I can. Now it lowers my blood pressure. This is more a caricature of me than a portrait – but, oh well.
Painting is 16″ x 20″ acrylic on stretched canvas.
Price: $150 plus postage
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When I first went on Facebook about 10 years ago, I did a search to see if there were other people named Cranford out there. I found Cranford Nix, Jr., and sent a friend request. It was accepted. I learned that he was a drug addicted rock musician, originally from Royal Oak, Michigan, who later lived in Blairsville, Georgia. What I did not learn until several months later was that he had been dead for about five years. He had “lived fast, died young, and left a beautiful memory” like the country song says.
Cranford Nix, Jr. was born on January 17, 1969, to Mama Dean Nix and Cranford Nix, Sr. His dad was the leader of a bluegrass band with two of his brothers and was inducted into the Bluegrass Hall of Fame. Cranford, Jr., suffered with mental illness and became addicted to the various drugs used to treat it. He mixed them with alcohol and heroin as well. He wrote songs about it. He had a gift of being lovable and conveying the joy of life to others. The irony was that he could not find a way to face life himself without self-medicating. A loving friend who maintains his music website put it this way:
This site is dedicated to the memory of Cranford Nix, Jr.. He was a really cool guy. He wrote and played great music. He made a lot of people smile.
How did Cranford die? – He died from drug and alcohol abuse. Please don’t do drugs, or try to emulate Cranford’s lifestyle. He struggled with addiction his whole adult life. His death wasn’t cool or glamorous. It was terribly sad and a tragic waste.
Cranford died on March 12, 2002, leaving behind a young widow and two sons. He was just 33. He had touched a lot of lives. So many people loved him. It wasn’t enough.
Cranford, Sr., passed away on October 14, 2012, and was buried next to Jr., whom he always called “Little Man”, in Blairsville, according to his instructions. So I remain, to my knowledge, the only known, living, first-named Cranford.
Painting is 24″ x 12″ acrylic on stretched canvas.
Price: $100 plus postage
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I knew Fred since 1998, when he was 20 and I was 43. This was when he started working at Keeney Printing in Lansdale. I printed all of my icons and notecards there for my icon business for several years. I got on Fred’s nerves as I was a customer run amok. Marg Keeney had given me a key to the shop. I would come in after hours and use the copiers and the computers to make my prints. At times, I had to come in during the day to print as well. Fred was friendly enough, but he had an even darker sense of humor than I do. He loved heavy metal music and extreme graphics that to me appeared fantastical and gruesome. He was excellent at what he did, with attention to every detail. He was serious about what he did and was not afraid to put in long hours to get jobs done on time and done right.
Fred worked at Keeney for 13 years, until he was 33. He finally found a woman whom he loved. On 4th of July weekend in 2011 he intended for her to join him at his cabin in northern PA, where he was planning on asking her to marry him. However, she broke up with him. He took his own life at that cabin on July 4, 2011.
Fred’s death was devastating to his dear friend, boss and co-worker, Michael Keeney, as they were close comrades at and after work. Michael loved Fred like a brother.
I have lost 18 close friends and relations to suicide and a total of 43 acquaintances. My therapist asked me how I deal with all that grief. I replied, “Apparently not that well. That’s why I’m here.”
We have all heard people say that suicide is such a selfish act, because it hurts everyone who loves or even knows the victim. We have all heard that suicide is “the coward’s way out”; that it is braver to stay and fight to solve one’s problems. These sound like logical arguments against suicide to those who are left to grieve. But to the one suffering extreme depression and despair, they are bullshit. Through the depression and bipolar support group I attend I have met several people who have tried to commit suicide several times. It is not easy to carry out. It is not for the ‘coward’ or the feint of heart. If one does it wrong, one can end up living with permanent brain damage or some other lasting disability, along with the shame and regret that one did this to oneself. When a person is contemplating suicide, it is not to hurt other people; quite the opposite. It can come from a strong, false belief that the world, including one’s nearest and dearest would be better off without them.
So what is the best suicide prevention? This may sound trite or simplistic to you, but I believe it is love. But that love needs to be expressed by a willingness to just be with a person who suffers with a mood disorder. Logic, persuasion, expert advice don’t go near as far as just a willingness to take the risk to be a friend, knowing that may not be enough.
“Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly. Never be wise in your own sight.” – Paul of Tarsus
The painting is acrylic on 11″ x 14″ stretched canvas.
Price: $80 plus postage
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Bobby was a good friend in grade school and junior high. His family lived two blocks away from mine in Golden Valley, Minnesota. We would bicycle together, sled and skate together in the winter, and sometimes camp out in our backyards together in the summer. He was a beautiful boy! He was handsome, with thick, dark hair, athletic and smart. All the girls loved him. Most of the boys wanted to be him. He did not appreciate all the attention. He was shy and became more withdrawn in his junior and senior year in high school; to the point of not allowing any pictures of himself to appear in the yearbook. This painting is based on his two pictures in the 1971 Robin. The pose is from the soccer team’s group shot, but his eyes were closed, so I looked at his yearly picture for details of his face.
The last time I saw Bobby was in the spring of 1974. I was visiting a few of my friends at the University of Minnesota’s main campus. At that time Pioneer Hall was for both men and women; every other room for each gender. I greeted Bobby as he darted stark naked from the showers to his room. I was shocked at this, not because of modesty, but his apparent lack of it. He had changed, and changed radically. Early December, 1974, we heard the news that Bobby had shot and killed his father, his mother and his sister, Ann, then himself, with a 12 gauge shotgun in the middle of the night in their Golden Valley home. A neighbor discovered their bodies four days after when North Memorial Hospital called her to check on his father, because he had not showed up for his on call assignment. He was a doctor.
Bobby’s case was written up in a feature article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune. He had suffered some sort of mental breakdown prior to this and had been in treatment. He left the treatment and had been alienated from his family. They reached out to him. He was home for dinner that night to discuss re-entering treatment as an inpatient. After they had all gone to bed, Bobby got his hunting gun and shot his parents and his younger sister while they lay in their beds. Then he shot himself.
The four of them had a joint memorial service at Valley of Peace Lutheran Church. Their were four, beautiful Christmas wreaths on stands in the front of the packed church. Pastor Stine gave this horrible message. He said, “Heaven is God’s gift to us at Christmastime. Bobby gave his family their Christmas gift early.”
I got up, then and there, and walked out of that church! What an ass! This was the same ignorant pastor who had kicked me out of confirmation class one month shy of completion for asking too many questions about heaven and hell, and how one gets to heaven, after my best friend, Steve Rainoff had died by falling through a skylight, chasing a soccer ball, in a locked school in New Jersey.
In the spring of 1975, the Mpls. paper had a feature article on Angel Dust. The authorities had just seen a rise in its use. The symptoms of its use and long-term effects sounded just like Bobby. I have always wondered if he could have been exposed to that, and that is what changed his personality so never know.
I painted his portrait in monochromatic phthalocyanine blue, from a happier time in his life. Bobby was a beautiful boy. He had all the advantages. This could have been me.
Painting is acrylic on 11″ x 14″ stretched canvas.
Price: $100 plus postage
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I decided to paint this moment in my sister Sue Ann’s life in the same style I originally captured it on film with my Instamatic camera just over 45 years ago. The painting is square, slightly out of focus, with a yellowed border as if it sat in a drawer all those years like the actual snapshot.
Sue Ann was copy editor for our high school yearbook, the Robin, for 1971, her senior year. I was the only sophomore on the annual staff. That was a violation of longstanding tradition. They were shorthanded for the Academics Section due to illness. I had submitted a number of poems for the book that demonstrated my talent. I started writing secretly, submitting articles through Sue Ann. A couple of months in, I was publicly accepted, when we had to start doing all-nighters to meet deadlines. Sue Ann was a tough editor. Articles had to be brief, yet packed with stories that would be understandable decades later. She and Janice Eisenhart, editor-in-chief, and Helen Olsen, our adviser, wanted a book that was to be a true time capsule; a reference students and others would be able to read years and decades later and get an accurate picture of the year at RHS. We all worked extremely hard to make that happen. This was before personal computers or word processors. We had to manually print on the layout grids each character of text, accounting for exact pica widths and justification. Then we would ship sections of the book off to the publisher at a time and wait to see how it looked. This painting is of my sister taking her first look at the finished book, the night before it was to be distributed at RHS.
The book won national awards. It received mixed reviews at school. That was OK. We expected that. It was not the usual, school spirit, jock centered, kitschy review of the year. There are no inside jokes or private messages. Forty-five years later, it reads well, and its style does not seem dated. This was a proud moment for Sue Ann, and no small accomplishment.
Sue Ann went on to Concordia College, Moorehead, MN, for a year, then continued at Augsburg in Minneapolis. She had taught me to write, and to be a ruthless self-editor. While at Augsburg, she lived at home. I ended up typing her English Lit. papers, in the wee hours of the morning. I became her editor. Her English prof. was my British Lit. teacher’s husband. They compared notes. One day, Mrs. Wood asked me if Sue Ann helped me with my papers. I told her No, but that I edited hers. However, Sue Ann had taught me how to write, so our styles were indistinguishable. She shared this with Prof. Wood, and reported back that they had a good chuckle over their Chardonnay.
This is in my suicide series of paintings. Sue Ann had started drinking regularly, as well as using various recreational drugs, while at Concordia. Both of our parents and three of our grandparents were alcoholic. Sue Ann got married, had three kids, was a paralegal, then an accountant. She decided to try to do an intervention on our dad to get him treatment for his alcoholism. That’s when she confronted her own. She went into treatment. She and her husband joined AA. She was after everyone to join AA. At some point, in her 40s, she became addicted to gambling. She ended up squandering the family’s resources, and had just separated from her husband and moved into an apartment on her own when she took her own life with a drug cocktail. She was about to be confronted by her boss for embezzling money from his companies. It was November 29, 2000. She was 47.
She had been a great mom. The great irony here is that she and I were the main, informal suicide hotline counselors when we were in junior and senior high.
I am the youngest of four siblings, yet my memories have always gone back further than my sisters and brother. This is a painting of the house where I lived for my first six years (June 1955 – June 1961). It still stands. The outside finishes and windows have been updated, but it is still the same tiny Dutch Colonial. It is almost totally obscured by trees on Google Earth. When we lived there, those Google Earth shots would have been impossible! The place was literally crawling with children! (also skipping, jumping, climbing, hiding & seeking, chalk drawing, running,etc.) 1955 was the crest of the Baby Boom after all. Crystal Lake was across the street. That is where the Ericksons, Hostermans and DeLays lived.
Our house was at 4438 Shoreline Drive, Robbinsdale, 22, Minnesota. Postage stamps were 4 cents. Flags had 48 stars. Everybody liked Ike. Our phone number started with KEllogg 7. I knew all this when I was three. My earliest and most powerful memory was being held in the arms of my godfather, Harold, when I was not yet two years old, in the dining room of that house. He was looking out the door to the screened-in porch. I remember the feel of his laugh, and that it was one of the few times I felt truly happy and safe in that house.
Not long after that party, Harold took his own life. It wasn’t clear, at first, that he intended to. There was no note. Harold had the form of acrophobia that would cause him to have a strong urge to jump from open heights. I have it, too. It is actually an idea, seemingly hardwired in the brain, that the scariness of being on the precipice would be relieved, if one would only throw oneself on the wind and fly. Harold flew. His wings burned up like Icarus’ in the Sun. I simply never saw Uncle Harold again; never smelled that smell; never saw that smile; never felt that embrace; never felt that laugh again. (Further investigation revealed that he apparently did mean to exit that day.)
That’s me, in the red jumper, asleep in Harold’s arms. My therapist asked me, when I showed her this painting, “So safety must be a big concern for you. What do you do to make sure you are safe?”
I asked her if that was a trick question.
Christmas Eve, 1971, my neighbor across the street and childhood playmate, David Erickson, was dead in a plane crash in Peru. That wasn’t the start of the deaths. The suicides started from 8th grade on: Dean and Stephen and Mark and Scott and Bobby and Lynn and Sue Ann and Fred and the list and the tears don’t stop . . .
Painting is 11″x14″ acrylic on stretched canvas.
Price: $100 plus postage
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I met Brad on a late spring evening, I think it was 1990, when we were serving homeless people food with The King’s Jubilee. He was under 25, white, of slight build, literate. He had just found himself homeless. His mom had moved in with her boyfriend and there was no room for him. His dad had disappeared several years before. Brad was afraid of what might happen to him on the streets. Nothing in his life had prepared him for this. He felt completely vulnerable.
The next week, Brad came to eat with us again. This time, he was all disheveled and he was talking to himself and arguing with himself the whole time he was in the line. I was able to speak with him privately after everyone had eaten and the crowd had dispersed. He told me that a couple of the old hands on the street told him that the number one rule of the street is that you never mess with a crazy person. So he decided to start acting crazy as a defense, so nobody would mess with him. He learned to survive and cope on the street. I tried to direct him to programs that might help him get off the street, but space was very limited, and he didn’t fit into any of the usual categories.
After a few months, Brad stopped coming by to eat with us. A few more months passed and he showed up again. He was acting like a full-blown, psychotic, paranoid schizophrenic or someone on a very bad trip. The problem was he wasn’t acting anymore. He had fully inhabited the role he had chosen and had forcibly driven himself crazy; like method acting gone terribly wrong. Almost twenty years later I would still see him from time to time. Some nights he would be better than others. Instead of the frightened young man, he had become a quite aggressive 40 something man and was quite direct in asking for or demanding what he wants. It reminds me of a program I heard on the radio about bullies where a psychologist described aggression as preemptive fear.
The irony with Brad was that his crazy behavior was not irrational. On one level, it had served him well. He was still alive after spending almost 20 years on the street, because no one messes with a crazy person; but at what a horrific cost.
Price: $80 plus Postage.
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