Thread: New studio
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Old 07-04-2014, 03:27 AM
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joseph engraver joseph engraver is offline
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Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: Sarzana,Italy
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Default The Black Nuns

Here is the start of a new painting; it is of my Guardian Angel Great Aunt Lillian. I am working from a 3x4 black and white photo. I have taken this photo everywhere with me for many years. I have finally worked up the courage to try and paint her image on canvas.
And here is another story that I hope you will enjoy
I left the farm and Great Aunt Lillian I was taken to live with my new found mother and my stepfather Ernest in a long grey apartment building in Nashua, New Hampshire. As I was a stranger to my mother and stepfather it must have been a shock for them to learn that I was not house trained.
It was not a happy occasion for me also as I now had a mother that I did not know, and a father that I immediately did not like or trust who was determined to sever me from my curse.
He would wake me up in the middle of the night to go to the toilet and stand over me while I tried to urinate, but that did not work out well for me or him.
In exasperation he showed me a big butcher knife and threatened to cut it off .I can tell you this did not help my bladder to function one drop better.
Finally at his whit´s end he took me in his car to the Canal Street Bridge then held me over the side. “You see that river down there? If you don’t stop pissing the bed, I’m going to throw you in it.” I looked down into the black waters swirling below me and promised him that I would... He put me back in the car and drove home .I went to bed where the nightmares continued and the fountain of youth flowed.
Ernest, who was Catholic, but never went to church, placed me in a boys school which ended my time living with my new parents...
I remember that house with the cross on the top and the black habits of the determined nuns clearly. It was a large silent two-story building made of dark red bricks and black cold stone floors. On the chapel wall was a dead man wearing a diaper, he was nailed by the hands and feet to a wooden cross and there was blood dripping from a large cut in his side. On the opposite wall adjacent to him was hung a picture his heart wrapped in a wreath of thorns..
I decided that cut in his side was where the nuns had taken his heart out.. I can tell you that all this put the fear of God in me.
After I was told that the man on the cross was Jesus Christ and he was Gods son I thought, if this is what was done to Gods own son what were those nuns going to do to me?
I was taken to the shower room and told to strip off my clothes. I showered while a nun watched to make sure I did .Once clean and dry I was given blue short sleeved shirts ,black trousers, grey socks, sweater ,black shoes a red necktie and new under wear. Then I was taken to the dormitory, showed my new bed with white sheets and locker to place all my new cloths in.
I had heard of the Nazi torture camps and was now sure that my fate had been sealed and I was a prisoner of the nuns.
The next place I was taken to was the cafeteria with long wooden tables and benches. Three times each day before every meal we boys wearing the same uniforms would all kneel on those stone floors and say our prayers. ‘Hail Mary full of Grace; The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want, Holy Mary mother of God pray for our sins’ and let me tell you that I had a lot of sins
I hated it, I hated the prayers, I hated the nuns with their black dresses and crosses with a dead Jesus hanging from their necks, and I hated the nightclothes I was made to wear.
Most of all I hated the dormitory where every night the nuns would tie a towel around my waist and make a big knot in the middle of my back. This was to keep me from sleeping on my back, which was supposed to keep me from wetting the bed. No water after supper was also another of the nun’s nightly rules. I would go to bed every night to snickers and laughs of the other boys.. All of this misery and still I soaked the bed like Old Faithful.
I do not know if the nuns gave up on me or what happened, but one day Ernest came to the school and I was set free.
When I was returned to Gillis Street, I had a big surprise: a new baby sister. Her name is Vivian. She was born pre-maturely and weighed only three pounds and four ounces. She spent many weeks of her tiny life inside of an incubator. Once in a while I would go with my mother to the hospital to see her. The arrival of Vivian and the attention she required changed my life considerably, for the better.
Attached Images
File Type: jpg aunt lillian 001.jpg (49.0 KB, 0 views)
File Type: jpg 001.jpg (33.5 KB, 0 views)
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