Dear House of Horrors,

You weren’t so terrible after all. Growing up mixed-race, in a community that doesn’t know how to perceive me, as one of seven children, knowing the pains of poverty, alcoholism, addiction, and seeing generational curses passed down first hand, your house of horrors provided a peculiar comfort to me. No child should have to witness what happens when murder plagues your family history, but I did. Through the yelling, the fights, the numerous police calls, and the sadness that plagued you, the house of horrors birthed something beautiful.

Mom and dad did the best they could, but distractions, taking care of my autistic and schizophrenic siblings, and my grandmother, who suffered dementia, chaos became known to me very early on. And I kept hearing the same things: blood is thicker than water, but when you grow up in the house of horrors of what is you, I’d rather be swimming in the coldest ocean than have to face what’s behind these doors. But still, you fed me, clothed me, allowed me space to pray, solace to write, to create, to become.

And I left you for a time, out into the world to New York City, where I sought out to follow my dreams, only to find myself broke, broken, and on the run, back in your house of horrors, filled with even more pain and suffering than I knew before. A sadness wrapped me up like a familiar blanket, because generational curses don’t end, unless they end with you.

So here I am, forgotten. Not knowing who I am anymore. Feeling as though I am withering away and slowly losing the memory of the powerful angelic tongues my mother prayed over me from in her womb, and throughout my childhood. The gifts I was given from the great holy mystery, which I know to be God, as a writer, as a poet, and as a dreamer. I was trapped in your dark, haunted, house of horrors, living my true life Shameless, so desperately wanting to be a character in Cheaper by the Dozen, but feeling left behind.

But then, he broke me. Or so I thought. And as I spoke the words to Yemaya, “I call all parts of myself back to myself”, my tower moment cracked me open. My world crumbled, and yet something beautiful happened in your house of horrors. I could see again. And as I took my blind fold off, I heard, maybe for the first time, the voice of God.

As I reconnected with Mother Earth and poured my healing cries into her soil, I looked at myself in my phone and saw her. I saw my beautiful smile, which is more than skin deep, and saw myself again. Her, teenage her, when the world felt lighter, laughing her, woman her.

She danced in the house of horrors and broken home, laughed and sang, jumped, twirled, played, wondered, prayed, and wished.

And she wrote again. I wrote again. I wrote when it didn’t make sense, and I write now because I know that living in the house of horrors wasn’t because I was abandoned or broken, it was my testimony. And now, at 31, as I venture off into new waters, in my golden year, I thank you, house of horrors. Not only am I more than enough, but I embody and embrace all of which makes me, me, in this lifetime, and all lifetimes to come.

So now, when I look in the mirror, I smile at the reflection because I recognize her again. Hello again, beautiful girl, beautiful me, beautiful you.