My Choice

By Yuriria Avila

Jimmy sits on the grass observing the cars. He takes notes on everything he sees. The time, the area, the number of passengers and the type of vehicle. He’s doing this one-day job because the Berkeley County Government offered him 300 dollars, food, and hotel for 14 hours of work.

Jimmy is 42. He doesn’t have any other job, but he paints as a hobby and sometimes sells his paintings to galleries. Sometimes he just gives them away.

Recently, Jimmy had a discussion with his mother. He grabbed a paint with his hand and threw it against the wall. He felt so good that he did it a second time. And a third time. He hasn’t stopped painting since then.

He paints people that have hurt him, or he has hurt and feels bad for it.

He paints Megan, a girlfriend that he loved and who loved him back even after learning he was sick.

He paints with his fingers because no one taught him to use brushes.

He paints on buildings with spray cans.

He paints sunrises, planets or constellations,

He paints with bright colors when he is feeling joy.

He paints his ideas when he’s feeling depressed.

“I have fallen to the darkness inside, against my will,” he wrote after doctors told him he didn’t have many years left. “Silence screams, no one hears. I hear them constantly. He’s now consuming my soul, drawing my existence.”

He thinks that no one should be told that they’re going to die.

He stopped going to doctors since then.

He has seen family members die of different types of cancer even though they took medicines.

He thinks that medicines made them even sicker. He doesn’t want to be like them.

His parents didn’t support his decision of not taking medicines.

He wrote on his neck “My choice” because he thinks it’s his body, His choice.