Sometimes I hope to get an "atmospheric" effect, free from fussing about true colors or true form. The battle of the right and left brains.

I'm forever experimenting. Sometimes I find I have made an image that takes others some time to appreciate what I have done. Some combination of impressionism, realism and abstraction would suit my sensibilities.

I've been on a lot of walking trips that often included walking through some farmer's pastures. That way, you get a good look at the cows, and they get a good look at you. So why not do a watercolor.

Whether or not to work from photographs or "en plein air"? A professional artist can always tell the difference.

I tried to melt the building, a 19th century paint factory in Gloucester, into the landscape.

My work with the Passamaquoddy inspired me to do this painting.

Excerpt from unpublished book, The Pain of Silence, about life in an institution for the retarded.

TOM

Chapter One:

-i-

A dirty haze obscured Sylvia Morton's view of the fields rushing past. Except for slivers of forest now and then, the rolling farmland went on forever. A sudden jolt brought tears to her eyes. It was her back again. She patted her stomach, already starting to show. She looked to see if Tom was okay. He was still sucking his thumb. What was the matter with the boy?

"Oakdale One Mile," the sign read. Angus Morton followed the road through a field covered with a thin dusting of snow. Sylvia bit her lip. Tom put his hand on the steering wheel. The timing was all wrong. Angus parked the car.

The nursing office was just inside the front door of a large brick building, and the door was open. Tom sniffed.

Sylvia shoved Tom ahead of her.

"Good morning," said Mrs. Whitting, a tall, robust woman. "Please have a seat."

Mrs. Whitting took off the jacket to her tweed suit. The lenses of her glasses sparkled dully as her head bobbed in and out of the sunlight coming through the large window behind her. The flashes hypnotized Tom.

"It's nice to meet you," said Mrs. Whitting.

Angus stood silently, his hands in his pockets, and looked out the window at the snow.

"He has such a temper," Sylvia said, "and he doesn't talk."

Angus turned towards the nurse. "Tom's always been a problem, right from the beginning," he said. His hands shook as he spoke. "I was against adopting him. There's something wrong with him."

Sylvia glared at her husband. "We can visit Tom, can't we?" she said. She started to sob.

Mrs. Whitting walked to the front of the desk. "We'll take good care of Tom. He'll fit in perfectly with the other children. You can visit him as often as you like."

"Will he be safe?" Sylvia said.

"Of course," Mrs. Whitting said. "Now give Tom a hug. They usually only cry for a few minutes."

Sylvia kissed Tom on the cheek. Angus patted Tom on the head. Without looking back, they left the room and walked down the hall.

Mrs. Whitting put her arm around Tom's shoulder. He trembled and pulled away. He stood in the doorway, his eyes opened wide. Somewhere a door banged shut, the sound echoing loudly. Water gushed through distant pipes. Tom stood frozen in the doorway, his fingers digging into his coat sleeves.

No shades or curtains covered the windows in Nursery One, just bars. When the sun came up, it was light, a series of dark stripes streaking across the floor. When the sun went down, new shadows filled the room. Tom sat in these shadows feeling empty.

His bed was the thirteenth in a row of fifteen, with the same number of beds on the opposite wall, the sides of one bed touching the next. Days were long, but nights went on forever, the air filled with choking smells and creepy sounds.

A month passed. Tom was losing weight.

One afternoon, an older boy, a brute with wide-set eyes, picked up a chair and smacked Tom in the ribs. He cried. No one came. He waited. Still no one came. He continued to wait. Gradually, still in pain, he noticed that something was missing. It was the emptiness. The emptiness was gone. Pain made the emptiness go away.

After three months, pain no longer bothered Tom.

He was in a strange world. A tall gangly kid spent hours twirling a piece of string, rocking from side to side, growling if Tom came near. The kid never looked at him, not when he tossed his shoe at him, not when he put his hands in his face, not when he stuck his fingers in his nose, not ever. One day the kid fell on the floor and shook all over. A large damp stain appeared in the crotch of his pants. Tom stood still and stared, the hairs bristling on the back of his neck.

Then there was another kid, with only one eye. The one-eyed kid searched the floor all day looking for specks of dirt or bugs which he put into his mouth. Tom watched him swallow the bugs. It was disgusting. And there was another kid, one who was always smiling. This kid was always trying to pull down his pants. Tom tried to keep away, but once the kid caught him. The next thing Tom knew, he'd bitten the kid, hard, on the hand. The kid ran to the attendant.

"That Morton's a pain," said the chain-smoking attendant.

"Do you want me to tell the doctor?" the nurse said.

"What for?"

"So's he can get the dentist to pull out Tom's teeth."

"That don't sound too good."

"We do it all the time."

Tom lost four front teeth.

Every morning at breakfast, Tom looked around warily, trying to guard his food so that the smiley kid didn't steal it. One day when the kid stole his toast, Tom hit him. It worked. It worked the second time too, and the third. After a while, all Tom had to do was raise his fist. The smiley kid left him alone. So did the others.

Tom liked to sit on the swings. At first, he didn't go very high. Then, bit by bit, he went higher....and higher. It was like flying. Just when he'd reached the highest point, it was time to go to school.

School was boring. The teachers (and everyone else) assumed that he was severely retarded. He didn't talk, did he? They gave him puzzles, the same ones, over and over. They made him listen to Old McDonald. He hated Old McDonald. He heard it a million times. All he really liked to do was sit on the swings.

Once a month, the attendants took him to the farm to pet the sheep. That was fun. He got to cross the road and climb the hill to the farm buildings. Most of the time, he sat on the ward staring at the ceiling, doing nothing.

One day, when he was nearly nine, he started to talk. "Get outta' my stuff." "Gimme' that." "Get lost." He was like a broken water hydrant, the sudden outburst totally unexpected.

In no time, he was as tricky as a hungry fox.

His favorite mischief was coaxing girls into the barn. The fun never lasted more than a week. "He took off my clothes and lay on me," the girls told the staff.

"I didn't do nothin'," Tom said.

Staff warned Tom to settle down or they'd send him to jail.

-ii-

Max Schaeffer's luck was rotten. No matter what he set out to do, something always went wrong, especially after he joined the Communist Party. It was just his usual bad luck when he ran out of gas half way to Oakdale. He looked at his watch. He'd never make it on time. They probably wouldn't have hired him at the bank anyhow.

He looked around. The silo of a dairy farm loomed above the trees less than a hundred yards away. He slammed the car door and kicked his feet in the dust as he walked towards the farm.

The farmer, a quiet man with a faraway look in his eyes, listened to Max, then shifted the brim of his battered felt hat and asked him if he wanted a job. Why not?

In less than a month, Max felt the tension drain from his insides. It was the best thing he'd done for years. But he was feeling restless. It still wasn't what he was looking for.

Then, one day, Max saw an ad in the local newspaper. Oakdale had an opening on its grounds crew. That settled it. He scooted over to the school and took the job.

The farmer invited him to stay. Max turned down the offer. There was something irritating about Oakdale that drew his attention. The austere brick buildings, neatly squatting in rows, one after another, tall chain-link metal fences at their sides, horrified him. The solemn, dark smokestack next to the electric plant, sometimes belching black smoke, sometimes gray, was cold and foreboding.

"How come so many patients don't have front teeth?" Max asked an old-time attendant, a sad-looking man sitting next to the locked door of his ward reading a newspaper.

"Cause they bite," the man said.

"Bite what?" Max said.

"Each other. Ever notice how some of 'em are missen parts of their ears and noses?"

"Why do they look drugged?"

"Got to do somethin' when they smash windows or throw chairs."

"Why is that man tied to his bed?"

"Exposing himself, shoven' things up his ass."

"The man in the cage?"

"Tried to burn the place to the ground."

"Is there no other way?"

"I don't know. They keep tryin' different things, but whatcha goin' to do? There's only a few of us and two thousand of them. 'Sides, they don't pay us shit."

Max was shocked. He began to feel restless again.

-iii-

Tom was working in the laundry, a large, ivy-covered building that looked like a power station. On either side of him, gigantic washers and dryers throbbed and set up a constant vibration. In the middle of the morning, the washer nearest the door whined loudly, then stopped. The attendant picked up the telephone. Tom put down his work and stared at the washer.

Shortly, a fat middle-aged man in coveralls entered the far side of the room with a tool bag. Tom shuffled over to the man as he opened his tool bag.

"Whatcha' doin'?" Tom said.

"Fixing the machine," Max said. "How about you?"

"Nothin' but watchin'."

"Go right ahead and watch."

A week later, Max quit his job on the grounds crew.

-iv-

It was nearly ten in the morning, and The Oakdale Lounge wasn't due to open for a few minutes. Max was squeezed into the space between the sink and the counter like a cork in a bottle. He mopped the back of his neck with a dish towel, took a drag on his cigarette and blew a smoke ring. He watched the undulating circle spread upward until it was pierced by a shaft of light. He sighed, the smell of smoke, malt, dishwater, and bacon fat filling his nostrils. He picked up a beer mug from the soapy water in the sink, wiped it with the towel, and hung it on the overhead rack. Except for the ticking of the old Gainesville railroad clock on the back wall and the buzzing of the neon sign in the front window, the room was silent.

Isolated from the town, the bar sat at the top of a small rise, barely separated from a clump of white birch trees. Several vans, pickup trucks, and late-model cars were parked near the road.

The bar was easy to find. "Bear right at the fork in the road,"Max said. "You can't miss it. We're opposite the school." The locals knew what he meant. Max picked up another mug. It was chipped. "Damn," he muttered. The glass shattered in the bin beneath the counter.

The clock struck ten, and the door opened. Tom entered, dressed in baggy trousers and a blue work shirt. He let the door slam, rattling the bottles on the back counter. Max looked up. Tom had a puzzling grin on his face as he climbed onto a stool next to the shiny oak counter. He rested his callused hands in front of him.

Max stopped his ritual cleaning. Without a word, he poured Tom a beer. Tom grabbed the mug and tilted his head backwards, the beer spilling on the stubble covering his cheeks.

Tom studied the yellowed movie poster of Marilyn Monroe taped to the mirror running the full length of the bar. The edges of the poster curled off the surface of the mirror, and a tear extended through Marilyn's left eye. Tom cradled the mug with his hand, again tilted his head backwards, and set the mug back on the counter. He wiped the foam from his cheeks with the sleeve of his jacket.

"They're all bums," Tom said.

"Who?" Max said.

"The workshop. They told me to leave. I'll show them. I'll sit here for the rest of the day."

Max stretched. The Gainesville clock continued its monotonous ticking. Max picked up another mug.

"They don't do nothin' for you across the street," Tom said.

Max grunted.

"I can't read. I can't write." Tom bit the tip of his thumbnail. "Who'd hire me?"

"Plenty of people."

"That's a lie," Tom said. He banged his mug on the counter. "Lies....I'll tell you who else lies....my social worker."

"How do you mean?"

"My social worker promised to set up a meeting with my mom three months ago. I ain't seen her yet."

"I see what you mean." Max started to clean the counter.

"How could you? You don't know what it's like."

"Do you want another drink?"

Tom shook his head and resumed his study of the poster. What a sight, his reflection in the mirror next to Marilyn Monroe. If only....but it would never happen, not in a million years. She'd never notice him. She was so beautiful, so perfect....except for the tear through her eye.

"What happened to Marilyn Monroe?"

"You don't know?"

"Nope."

"She killed herself."

"Damn. I wish I'd met her."