Tragic Curiosity

This piece of artwork (pictured left) is the one and only creation of my birth mother's in my possession. Her youngest sister, my biological aunt Steph, sent it to me a couple years ago.

Nicki used mixed media, ink and watercolor, to create what I've interpreted to be a personal editorial, depicting her living hell. Not a pleasant way to remember a person I've never known. It's quite strange though, despite being perfect strangers, her life has made such a profound and lasting impression on me.

Nicola, as she was named at birth, was the daughter of a very unlikely pair, Anthony (Tony) & Urania Petalas. While they were both full-blooded Greek, they came from very mixed family backgrounds. His family would have been considered in the old country as peasants and she haled from aristocratic stock. So their children were a blend of the two.

Nicki was the oldest of four girls, and her life is the story of
the candle which burned twice as bright but only half as long. She, a tortured soul, was only 27 when she died. Peace be with her now.

Her survivors, my other blood relatives, describe her as strikingly beautiful, quick-witted and brilliantly creative. Nicki was uber intelligent with an IQ of 168. I'm told my pleasure in writing was her gift to me, passed down to her by my maternal grandmother.

Her life's tragedy holds many lessons. Primairly it is believed she didn't feel capable of living up to people's high expectations of her. This one piece of her artwork is like a ghost, a mysterious, dark spector that continues to haunt my curiosity about the woman she was, the life she lived and what parts of my own being exist from her blood.