drawing and desire

I was looking for something that I had packed away long ago. I was in a bedroom of the house I grew up in, searching whilst other people were sleeping. I lay down on the floor and looked under the bed, pulling out boxes that were wedged in tightly. The boxes were full of beautiful jewelry: diamond brooches, sparkling necklaces, precious stone rings and bracelets. I discovered exquisite vintage clothing, silk scarves with fringing, velvet dresses, coats and lingerie. I looked until I found some colour pencils, took them and packed the rest of the things back under the bed.

I drew a picture of a group of people in relationship with one another—one man and three women. The man was dark, one of the women was Indian and another was pregnant and had small children. The man was having or had had a relationship with each of the women and one of the women was attracted to another woman in the group. I managed to convey the intricacies of their relationships by using different colours, expressions and symbols to visually explain their thoughts and desires. I used a white pencil to show the things that were abstract rather than physical, outlining rather than filling in the symbol, to represent what the other characters couldn’t see.

Because of this picture, I went on to create a picture book for adults that was beautiful and erotic in nature. My life changed and I was successful and abundant with newfound freedom and insight.

I then went back in time to when I was a teenager. I was sitting on the ground, leaning against a brick wall of the church I went to in my youth, watching as a couple of people took photographs of a girl I knew then: C. She was meant to be modeling a long jumper that sufficed as a dress. Another girl came along and they started photographing her in the same jumper. She was tall and athletic with blond hair and green eyes. I spoke to the girl and told her that I was from the future. I wondered if she would remember this moment later in life. She told me she was 16 so I realised that I was younger than that; younger than I had imagined I was. I told her that in the future I was an artist and writer, and said it was probably difficult to imagine as I was so young, quiet and dreamy at this age. We kissed and then she was sick. We went inside the church hall to get a drink of water from the kitchen and so she could rinse out her mouth. There were women working in the kitchen and I knew our being there was disturbing them. I felt angry and pushed aside. I felt as though I was not welcome.

I went into the hall and there was a person. I knew that I had known this person across lifetimes and said that maybe this time we could work it out.