SHILOH, THE MARTYR: CHAPTER ONE


My mother used to tell me that when the morning sun rises, God is welcoming a new day. She was an alcoholic, a verbal abuser, and addicted to pain killers but gosh darn it did she believe in “new beginnings.” In fact, she had a new, fantastic, yet unreachable goal every morning. I remember a particular morning when she smiled and looked down at me from the kitchen table and whispered into her mug of coffee, “Shiloh, today is the day when God will save us from my sins.”


We weren’t poor, nor were we ever in any compromising situations, but my mother would pray for a refined and proper new life
for her. In the daytime, she painted on huge canvases—always with a cigarette half-hanging out of her mouth and splashing paint all over herself. This made her smell like smoky lacquer. I used to adore it when she would put me in her lap and stroke my hair after she had been painting.


She would tell me that I was her gift; she used to say “Shiloh, you are my gift from God and I will cherish you as long as I shall live.” Afterwards, I would breathe in deep to fill my lungs with the smell of paint and cigarette smoke.


However enchanting her paintings were, they were not the main source of income. During the nighttime, she was a pole dancer at “Baby Katz Kool Klub”, the sleazy adult bar amidst all of the cheap shops selling hand-me-down clothing and shady used car dealers selling rubber band engine lemons that were littered up and down the streets in the city next to ours. After a while, she worked the bar “a little too much”, if you catch my drift. Then, she would get “a little too close” to the customers, who took out their sorrows on my mother, if you know what I’m saying. At last, these made the boss physically abuse her, which was just an excuse for my mother to take “just a little bit more” pain killers, if I’m making it clear enough.


This was how she became the alcoholic, verbal abuser, and pain killer addict that I have come to remember.


I am Shiloh Jones, daughter of Eliana Jones and I am twenty-nine years old. Two years ago I gave up my apartment and husband to become an artist. As you can see, I take after my mother already. I live on park benches and where ever God takes me from day to day. Tonight, my residence is “202, Markus Street, Miami, Florida” at a place called “Sun-Down Motel.” I paid thirty-five dollars for this room and I will spend every minute of my time painting.


As much as anyone claims that I take after my “hell of a” mother, I refuse to be anything else but an artist. Yes, I am the cliché, the real life model of what a starving artist should be—I refuse to sell myself to luxuries.


I am the martyr of modern-day artists. At least, that was what Samuel, my stepfather had taught me.

To be continued...

By: Sarah Cohen, 2007