Finding the Sun Through the Clouds. Dawnmarie Deshaies
I was able to laugh, play, and be me when we visited Maine.
On my dad’s side of the family, I had favorites too. Aunt Franny and Aunt Anne, Aunt Sue, and Aunt Tessie were all so cool. My aunt Sue and uncle Mac lived in Connecticut as well. We visited my aunt Sue often. She was always so sweet and kind. I loved all my aunts and uncles. Having a large family was nice because we always had someone to visit and catch up with. My aunt Dell lived in Connecticut. She married my mother’s brother. My uncle Dicky would always stop by our house on his way home from work to pee and get coffee from our house. He was a junkyard junkie and a massive hoarder. His van always had so many treasures in it, from chairs, tables, and just plain old junk. Every time we would visit them, which was often, my aunt Dell would be making the most beautiful wedding and birthday cakes. I remember loving to visit her so much because of all the excellent food and delicious smells of fresh-baked goods. We always had Thanksgiving dinner at their home because, let’s face it, who doesn’t love a home-cooked meal from scratch? She was the best cook ever—I will place money on it every time. My aunt and uncle had a big house, and they had two sons and two daughters. I would always stay in the house and visit with my mom. When I wasn’t having an asthma attack, my mother would let me go outside to climb the trees with my cousins and their friends. Ah, how I miss the smell of those fresh pines! We would play hide and seek, and the best part was their basement because it had so much junk in it that you could disappear for hours. Sometimes I would even get scared because of all the little creaks and hollow noises. I loved playing with them. We would sing and laugh for hours. We would ride bikes around the small town where they lived, and they also had a pool, so when summer rolled around, we would always visit and swim.
Alas, even with the endless joys of summer, my illness was still lingering in the background. The doctors simply told my mother and me it was just my allergies. I hated those words because they seemed like an excuse at that time for something wrong with me.
Chapter 4
Not Everything Can Be Perfect
Both my parents smoked cigarettes, so that didn’t help my breathing back then. Smoking was a part of the culture; it was thought to be filled with nutritious vitamins and minerals. How things have changed. I still, to this day, have never touched a cigarette in my life. I always felt different from all the kids around me, from my friends to my cousins. I was the sick child, the little wilted flower no one wanted to pick. In and out, in and out. The emotionless hospital and the isolated green tent were the second home I was used to. I wanted to be able to do a breath. It was a time of constant rotating medications. When the hospital would send me home after a week, my lungs felt better, but my mom would always be worried about me. I worried about her.
Every time I would have an asthma attack, I would have to go into my bedroom to breathe better. Some days, my mom would take me out shopping at the mall because they had air-conditioning and that meant we didn’t have to pay for it. And sometimes she would let me pick out clothing and we would put it on layaway. My mom would go in the store and make payments until it was all paid for, and when that happened, it was like Christmas to me. I would have new clothes and shoes. This was before they had credit cards—they had layaway. To me, this seemed normal. Both my parents worked so hard to make ends meet. I remember when my dad had lower-back surgery and he was out of work for the longest time. We had our family car repossessed, and that made things so hard for my mom; she was working double time to keep a roof over our heads.
I can remember eating fried bologna and bologna sandwiches with chips, and my mom always had Pepsi soda in the house and TV microwaved dinners, to be honest. My mother wasn’t an excellent cook, and she didn’t have the time to cook. My mother worked so hard all the time and was so tired from working hard that when she got home, she was utterly exhausted. We just made sandwiches and had microwave dinners.
My best friend, Meg, always had the newest and most beautiful clothing, and her mom stayed home and took care of the house. Sometimes her mom would make me a dress. I really liked hanging out with Meg. We also went to the same school. We both made the cheerleading team together. We loved it and felt like we were fitting in with the other girls. I began to perceive that some aspects of self-confidence began to flower.
Chapter 5
My First Job
I had my first job at Penny’s, a store in Norwich. It was convenient being so close to home. I would work after school. I was fifteen years old. I grew up knowing you had to work hard for your money and to never take things for granted. Seeing how all my other friends’ moms stayed home to take care of the kids would make me blue, knowing that my mother had to work so hard. She worked in a warehouse job doing screen printing by hand with other working women. I would ride my bike down to her work after school because I really loved watching all the colors spraying and splashing the yards of canvas, turning the seemingly endless rainbow barrage into the most wondrous clothing. There were so many giant rolls of fabric with thousands of different prints ready to be shipped out to clothing companies, and my mother was one of the many women who worked for hours and days creating such beautiful pieces of fabric. The designers should be lucky to have her employed, for without her, the prints would be just blank canvas.
I love my mother. She always told me how to work hard for a living even when you didn’t want to work. Her hands would be swollen from hard labor all day in an unconditioned, hot factory. The smell of paint in the air stained her hair and skin, bringing home a mixture of scents. These factories never had to air-condition, and with all the women working so hard, it made me wonder how it is that until these last few years, women are now getting the right to work in a proper workplace. When I would visit my mother at work, every one of her friends would always tell me I was going places. This beautiful regard baffled me back then because I never really imagined or knew what they meant. Having been raised by my mother primarily, I constructed my own thoughts on work ethic, and my mother was the cornerstone for that belief. Thank you, Mom, for making me realize that if I wanted something, I needed to work for it. Your persistence is a gift I still hold on to today. Even growing up with asthma, I never made an excuse for it. It was just something I had to deal with. Put a smile on your face and work hard. I learned this very early on in my life because I didn’t want to be different, so I would always smile and push through whatever was going on in my life. I just wanted to feel normal, and many years later, I learned normal isn’t always the best choice or option.
Chapter 6
High School, Young Adulthood, Emerging Phantoms, and Dreams
As my adolescence continued, I attended Norwich Academy of Fine Arts. From the age of thirteen to eighteen, I was influenced by this school in ways that helped me make the most of my life during this time. I went to work after school every day. I liked my job because I was making money for myself, but I loved everything about school. My passions resided in learning. I treasured all my fine art classes, and I had my favorite teachers instructing these classes. I felt alive painting. My inspiration for designing a love language in my own artistic fashion pushed my imagination to the limits. I began to imagine myself as one of the masters of impressionist and Renaissance art, like van Gogh, Monet, and da Vinci. While studying the work of the masters, I picked each individual detail that I admired from so many artists and developed my own art style. I created beauty with a black canvas, the art that poured from my fingertips striking me with emotion with each stroke. I poured everything into my art. The good, the bad, the ugly all represented aspects of my being expunged onto the canvas. My three favorite artists are Claude Monet, Leonardo da Vinci, and Vincent van Gogh. I always enjoyed reading their history and admiring their lifeworks. Could it be possible that I can create my own legacy of design? I hope to share my art with the world so you can see me for who I am. My mind is as beautiful as my body.
From admiring their works, I promised myself and my teachers that I will make it to Paris one day to self-actualize my belief in becoming a master by studying the physical copies existing in the art capital of the world. They would always smile and say, “I hope so, Dawnmarie. Your work needs to be seen and admired.” To this very day, I still have some of my old drawings and painting from school, and my mother still has some of her favorites as well.