Everyone has a dark, ugly side-some of us just choose to hide it better than others
She’s a young woman going through a mid-twenties crisis, trying to deal with the dark and intoxicating side of life with haunting memories of an abusive ex-boyfriend, remnants of a broken family and obvious mental health issues.
We all find something that is therapeutic, that is personal and special to us, that helps us cope. For her – it’s art.
Find an excerpt below that talks about how she found art and how it helps us be her in the present time.
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I gave the test and begged my teacher to score me the minute I submitted that piece of paper. I was so sure I’d get a 10 out of 10. I just wanted the formality of knowing out of the way, because the sooner I knew my marks the sooner I could get those crayons. My hands were itching to pull those gorgeous crayons out of the box and actually feel them gliding over paper, filling up the bland blank sheet with their colours.
The teacher raised her eyebrows at my worksheet and handed it back to me. She also patted my shoulder slightly.
Dang.
My stomach fell.
8/10.
I cried the whole bus ride back home. Or stared pointedly out of the window without even blinking.
I went home and dejectedly walked up to my mom and handed her the worksheet. She saw the score and stooped down to me and said, ‘You know what? I think you did well and I’m going to buy you those crayons anyway.’ Then she handed me fifty bucks and I ran to the shop, wild with excitement. Not only would I be the proud owner of that set of crayons, I also realized at that moment how much of a rockstar my mom was.
It was on that day that I decided that I would never put down the paintbrush, for as long as I lived, because of the faith that my mom showed in me. Sometimes it really just takes one empathetic glance, one touch of tenderness, and a teeny, tiny, minute sliver of hope to, I don’t know, set things rolling.
And since then, it’s been a pretty stable relationship (between me and my art). The only stable relationship I’ve ever had in my entire life, fortunately and unfortunately. I went from pastels to watercolours, pencils to charcoals, acrylics to oil paints, paper to canvas, and many other mediums. It is the only thing that helps me connect with myself. Not the me that is sedated with antidepressants and high on mood-booster pills. Not the me that is a lifeless machine running on tablets and capsules and surviving (barely) on therapy. But the me that’s . . . just me.
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A hard-hitting narrative of a young woman’s struggle with mental illness, Goner is a voice that needs to be heard today.
Can she defeat her infamous trait of self-sabotage and manoeuvre her way through some hard-hitting truths?