He was frightened by thunder... could draw like a Renaissance illustrator...could sit at the piano and pick out melodies as if the directions were on the keys...said of Monet's "Haystack" paintings..."I can paint better then that shit"...beat my mother and me...fucked anyone he could tackle...and didn't hide it...I found him one day at a 4th of July party screwing my mother's "best friend" on our kitchen sink. Women always found him attractive, at first...

My feelings for my father are "complicated"...he was racist, abusive, phobia ridden, manipulative but very clever...he died a drunk, his body ravaged by years of abuse...a tragic waste especially in the way he mistreated my mother. Forgivenss is impossible... indifference is the best I can muster.