I come from a background of divorce and grit. My young mother, with dreams bigger than her reality, married a much older man. He was an airline pilot in Cuba, his third marriage, and I’d be the last of his many kids. He was 64 when I was born, my mother in her early thirties. The man was tired, worn out. They divorced when I was three, in New Jersey. Immigrants, scraping by with hard work and blue-collar jobs. My father took whatever work he could find, mostly driving trucks. The communists in Cuba had torpedoed any real chances for future success in the United States. My two brothers and I ended up on public assistance.
Then my mother started dating another man, and that’s when the real chaos began. Drugs and alcohol stormed into our lives, ushering in years of domestic violence, drama, and constant moving. New schools, new roach-infested apartments every six months.
One day, a neighbor had a garage sale. We couldn’t afford much, but my eyes lit up when I saw a trunk full of drawing paper. An old-fashioned trunk, like the kind used on ocean voyages. The neighbor saw my excitement and handed it over. This trunk of paper followed us through every move, a rare constant in our turbulent lives.
An unsupervised childhood led to all kinds of wild adventures. I learned to climb barbed wire fences, break into factories, and steal pointless stuff. I still have a calculator I swiped from a classroom at Thomas Edison Elementary School in Union City. I sneaked into public pools and skateboarded down deadly hills. I watched mechanics work on Porsche 911s on Kennedy Blvd and 59th Street in North Bergen. One day, I found a black hardcover book there—someone’s sketchbook. It was filled with drawings in marker and charcoal. I kept it, studied it.
With a comic book obsession, a sketchbook, and all the paper I could ever need, I drew constantly. Mom and her man fighting? I drew. Mom out partying all weekend? I drew. Another new fifth-grade classroom? I drew. Visiting my tired old dad on weekends? We’d draw. He was good. In high school math class, I drew. Some counselor talking about my future? I nodded and kept drawing. If I got lucky, I’d draw a girlfriend or two. Wink wink, nudge nudge, you get it.
My older brothers were in the military—Navy and Marines. I looked up to them, figured I’d follow their path. Many of us blue-collar welfare kids did. But I was also a damn good athlete. Silver medalist in the New Jersey State Olympics for weightlifting, record-breaking discus thrower, wrestler, and award-winning football player. Third-team All-State defensive player, second-team All-State offensive player, “Lineman of the Year,” All-County Player. (Yeah, my “Al Bundy” is showing!)
My brothers said I’d be the first to go to college. I had partial scholarships, so college it was. But what would I study? Art? No chance—I didn’t know any artists. Art wasn’t in my friends' homes, except for those little casita sculptures in my Colombian friends' kitchens and the "Last Supper" kitchen clocks. Museum trips to New York City haunted me with Edward Hopper’s work, but art seemed for the rich and dead, not for me. So, psychology—my girlfriend at the time planned to study it. Honestly, I was probably just going for the football.
The day I was supposed to meet the team and get my gear, I got a phone call:
“Hello, Johnny?” “Yeah?” “Hey, it’s Dawn, your cousin. Do you remember me?” “Of course! What’s up!?” “I was told they were calling you all week.” “Who?” “The hospital where your dad was.” “Oh, I hardly ever answer the phone.” “Johnny, your dad died.” ….. “Here’s the phone number to call.”
I was numb. Reeling. Mentally lost. I didn’t play football, didn’t work out, didn’t do much of anything. I was shattered. I went to school, lived paycheck to paycheck, drifted from job to job. Got lost in debt and New York City. Discovered beer and marijuana. Developed a panic disorder.
Years later, I read a biography of Ayn Rand by Nathaniel Branden and found out about the Arts Students League of New York. That reconnected me to my buried artistic side. I started going to the ASL on 57th Street regularly. But I mostly kept it to myself. I still didn’t know what being an artist really meant.
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