"The Dance" Painting

2:30am Christmas morning 2007. After being awoken numerous times though out the night by PJ, Nat, Gabby & Lydia my four kids. Wanting to check if they could get up yet, not yet was my reply until@ 6:30am. Then it was on.........

A giant reds sack was setting in the living room with a large green an white tag........... A list of its content s written in old English

After the bag of Santa Clause gifts were given out I made my way into the kitchen to take a round of medication one of three for the day. I grabbed the box of doughnuts I bought the day before.......... I sat down and.

................... Mr. Brandwein do you know where you are? "What"

We are running some tests.............. "Wait what!!"

His brain waves seem to be abnormal..... Stroke maybe a seizure....... "What......."


Mr Brandwein my name is Dr XXXXX. You have been having a seizure. We're going to prescribe you some medication to help control & prevent seizures in the future.

December 28,2007 I came home not really knowing who I was. The four kids that met me at the door I played along with. Not asking were their mother was.

Over the course of the next couple of weeks/ months I learned I was divorced raising four kids by myself on disability. Not to mention the litter of Irish setter puppies that were born ten days before. I learned I didn't sleep the way I use to nor did I like to eat & drink the same things. I slowly learned to adjust. To this day I still don't know who I was & 90% of my memories have yet to return.

After a random evening of painting in 2009 with my kids it was pointed out to me I have a talent that I didn't have before. Painting is a way for me to think or not too. It helps with what can't be remembered and feelings that attach to the unknown.

Thank you for looking at my work, some of it comes from family time, some from pain & some from .......... Well I don't know.

Since that time in my life painting has become the glue & stressor that holds me together and stretches me to new.

I should explain that a little better for the longest time I wanted to know who I was; well the who before my seizure. My kids and some very close friends still to this day say I'm not who I was. Painting has put out what I don't remember and can not explain.

Before my seizure I was a Sheriffs Deputy and 4th degree Black belt in Kenpo Karate. All those memories are gone. That person made me to be someone. Someone I do not know.