My Painted Wall

As I walk up the sidewalk, I can see the entire frame of the front door has been ripped out of the brick wall, and is just propped into place, supported by the broken screen door. The lockbox is hanging on the doorknob, and a small kitten is peeking out from the gap near the bottom of the door. Not wanting to disturb this mess, I elected to walk around to the back door to see if that was open. It was. In fact, it was lying on the sidewalk in thousands of pieces of shattered safety glass. As I walked inside, I was suddenly aware of how thin the soles of my tennis shoes were. I could feel the pieces of glass crunching underfoot. I found myself standing inside of a nice, 1600 square foot ranch. It has 3 bedroom, 2 full baths, a garage that had been converted to a large family room with a wood stove in the corner. This house was worse than most the 12 foreclosed properties I had inspected earlier this day. The feeling of anger was everywhere in this home. Chairs had been thrown against the walls with such force, they broke through the sheetrock on both sides of the wall exposing the wiring. The nice white six panel doors were torn apart, opening their hollow cores, and broken mirrors, marble vanities, and ceramic toilet parts were scattered on the floors and imbedded into walls.

As violently damaged as this house was, I was surprised that I was distracted, still thinking about the last house I had been in.

The last house was a split foyer home with 3 bedrooms and a full bath on the upper floor, and two bedrooms and a full bath on the lower floor. The house was well worn, showing some signs of postponed maintenance... but it was clean, and had been well cared for. The windows on the front lower level had been boarded up after the foreclosure to help secure the property, so as I entered the darkened lower floor, I turned on my flashlight. As I turned the corner at the bottom of the stairs, my flashlight illuminated a paneled wall which had been painted years ago with a glossy white oil paint. That wall had been used as a canvas for graffiti, written in a bold red marker from ceiling to floor. The erie surprise of finding this painted wall in the darkened hallway illuminated only by my flashlight was disturbing... I no longer felt alone in the house.

I am in the business of helping investors buy foreclosed properties. This day I became acutely aware of the intense upset the the families must endure in the process of losing their homes. Each home must have it's story. I got to see into this one.

This is what was written on the wall...

My Painted Wall

May the Apache tear protect

me in this time of Remembrance.

Here is the end of the

whole mess, and I can

barely think of anything to

say. From this house of

Love, and Hate, and Yelling,

and hugs, and second chances

I will take away many things.

My Mothers gun, her knowledge,

her problems, her skills

her youth, her anger and

many other things, good

and bad, and in the end I

go with her love

and she with mine.

My Fathers Black Belt,

and with it the violence

he instilled in my life,

my brother's/sister's kukci

It is as strange and

unique as he, and with it,

lesson learned, may he find it.

My Grand Father's knife

though I did not know

him, it is still as sharp

as I'm sure he kept it,

and I will keep it that

way. May he live on through

it. I suppose I will also

take enough nostalgia to

kill a small village.

These are my

Words. Strip them,

Paint over them

This will always be...

My Painted Wall

(unreadable signature)

9/21/2008

good bye Mom!