Silent Scream

When I was 16, I had my first real job as a cashier at a pizza place in the San Francisco Centre at Fifth and Market. My very first paycheck I received fromn that job went to some clothes, a trip to Taco Bell and a CD...Slayer "South of Heaven". There was a lot of anger back then. That album seemed to speak volumes to me. The louder and faster it was, the more justified I felt. My mom had just left my dad, and I was left with an angry father and a clueless sister at home. I used to hide in my downstairs bedroom wishing someone or something would just come and take me away.

Darkness always appealed to me. I am not sure if it was the taboo of it, or the fact it seemed to meld with how I was feeling. I had been abandoned and did not understand why. I surrounded myself with negativity, mainly because it was familiar to me.

I remember it scared the shit out of my mom. She had come down to my bedroom not too long befopre she walked out, and seen all the posters all over my walls...Metallica, Guns N Roses, Slayer, etc. She almost had a heart attack. Her good Catholic school girl daughter mixing up in such evil things. She confronted my dad about it when he got home from work....taking him into my room and saying to him, "We are losing our little girl!!!" According to my mom, my dad just laughed at her.

That was probably right about when she had had enough of my dad. 19 years and thousands of tears and arguments later, she finally decided she'd had enough.

My mom left right about Thanksgiving, November 22, 1989 to be exact. I recall the conversation I overheard between her and my dad the day she walked away. I had even taped it.

Mom: "You remember a long time ago I told you that if you kept chipping away at what little love I have left for you that one day I would wake up and it would all be gone?"

Dad: "Yeah."

Mom: "Well, it's finally happened. I do not love you anymore."

I don't really remember the rest, but that part sticks out in my memory the most.