The Darkness

I'm not sure if it was all the heavy metal music i was listening to, or all of the horror movies I was watching, or perhaps a combination of the two, but as happy as I was as a kid, there  was still a darkness inside of me. I didn't really have any negativity or strife in my life asides from the odd smack or verbal lashing dished out by my old man, yet my mind was filled  with many dark visions of torture, terror & death.

The images in my mind started to manifest themselves on paper and to me it seemed like a good way to release the darkness. One of my most repetitive drawings I did was of an apartment building, and in each window a depiction of some form of vicious attack or murder was taking place. A mugger shooting his helpless victim, an irate husband stabbing his wife, etc. To me it seemed like a good way to get the darkness out of my system, much to my teachers dismay.  

I was hearing tales in the news and on television about the satanic undertones of heavy metal, people playing records backwards that delivered messages from the dark side. The PMRC was using metal as a scapegoat for teen suicide all over the world, not too mention any other crime they could pin on the music.  Kids at school started assuming I was a "devil worshipper" so I thought to myself if that's what they think/want then I'm going to give it to them!

To me it was all mind games and intimidation that worked to my advantage. I would eat bugs just to see people's reactions, I also had a very high pain tolerance so I would inflict injuries upon myself and let kids bite me as hard as they could. My claim was I had sold my soul to the devil in exchange for being impervious to pain.

I also had a very large collection of matches. Anytime I went somewhere new with my family I would grab a match pack as a token or souvenir to commemorate it. Now my collection was starting to dwindle as I was becoming somewhat of a pyromaniac, obsessed with the hell fires i was forged from. I started off burning small pieces of paper and piles of dried leafs and twigs. I graduated to bigger things such as trying to burn trees down. There was nothing like the rush of throwing one match into a field of dry grass and watching it turn into an instant inferno. 

One day while playing in the garage with matches my father caught me. Needless to say he was furious and it was quite possibly the angriest I had ever seen him! He went off about how I could have burned our house down and killed the entire family. As much as I loved burning stuff his words really hit home and made an impression on me. I decided to not play with fire (at home) anymore even though deep inside me "the darkness" was still there and the fire was still burning...