PORTRAIT OF A WOMAN CURSED?

I've made a pact with nefarious spirits, and now I'm paying for it. In my living "room," a space in my apartment, hangs a portrait of me. Pastel-drawn around 2004, the reflective, serious image resembles a darker side, a time when I had become lost. The artist captured me better than the family friend who'd paid me to pose for her art class. Objectivity often captures reality and the sadness, seriousness that my mother had thought didn't show the real "me," did--at the time.

(As seen on the cover, the actual title of Oscar Wilde's book was The Picture of Dorian Gray, the film's producers changed the title to The Portrait of Dorian Gray for the 1945 movie.)

Ten years later, I've begun to believe the picture, like Dorian Gray's has been cursed. For my hazel green eyes have maintained their youthful luster; smooth skin as pale and clear as what lay beneath the make-up then; honey-blond, (with a little help from Loreal) shoulder-length hair remains straight and soft,and an aquiline nose has kept its shape, but my heart has hardened. Not self-deluded as Dorian. No, what I believed ten years ago and what I know now represents a lifetime of experience.

The only connection my portrait has to the exotic is a cotton pull-over Bali-made blouse covered with flowers, given to me in Singapore which I chose on a whim to wear for the sitting. At first the assembled artists balked; however, one did not. She accepted the challenge without hesitation. The artist used her oil pastels to clearly depict the top half, the face, neck and shoulders. Then, the artist chose to have colors fade. As the viewer scans down the picture, the design, hues become barely perceptible, the pastel finishes, cut off at the bust. Sometimes, at night when the light is dimmer, my mind plays tricks: have the colors, flowers' shapes faded even further?

I'll save my family's story that the artist caught in my eyes; my roller-coaster love life and career, and debilitating medical issues that I've begun to manage--for a memoir farther down the road when its age-appropriate. I will reveal the the price that I've paid for being an author is isolation. To be a writer, one has to accept hours of self-imposed alone-time. Wilde had an underlying sympathy for his anti-hero, Dorian Gray, who as he ages grows mad from eternal loneliness. Like watching a blooming cactus, your eyes first see the lovely blossoms only to then absorb the prickly plant's true nature.

I haven't lost touch with reality. I inherited, learned survival skills from my late mother. Sure friends stay in touch via e-mail, others have dropped me, while others do call. And yet I realize how self-pity will jeopardize a writer's inertia. In fact, I've produced my best writing during this expanse. I'd bet Stephen King would sympathize, at least in his early days. Funny as I've grown older I've come to appreciate King's stories more and how he's maintained a semblance of sanity.

For with the strange dichotomy--a cherubic, fluid face versus a sharper, sometimes unchecked nature--comes a knowingness that without struggle, conflict and strife I could not have become who I am at present: a writer, no, an author.

***

The above is semi-autobiographical and is intended to be dramatized for publication. I attribute surface preservation to genetics and listening to my mother. Very fortunate. Oh, and I've gained pounds.

Curses? I have a writer's imagination and skeptical enthusiasm. Oh, and yes, the portrait does exist. Hmmmm..."Truth is stranger than fiction." (Mark Twain).

Blurred lines between the earth-bound and the spirit world? Read my first book, SHADOWWATER. Paranormal transformation? Read the sequel, DARK SEA, SHADOWWATER II. Both available on Amazon/Kindle and to order at bookstores. Please go to my website for more information and a direct link for ordering. www.shadowwater.net