The small apartment had an air of foreboding. When you are desperate and in need of living accommodations, a small rental fee clouds over all sense of our natural instinct of awareness. From almost the moment I stepped into the small dark cubicle that was the bedroom, an icy cold breeze circled around my ankles and began to cover the whole lower part of my body. The nausea rose up almost instantly. If not for grabbing on to the window sill, I would have buckled to the floor.

My inner feelings were to run, and keep running until the nausea and cold sweats stopped. Only then I felt, would I be safe from this imposing feeling of possession.

My life had taken on a sudden shift, Never really having much, now I had even less. I was alone and desperate.

Happy was never even on my survival list. Count our blessings, is what I had always been told. WHAT BLESSINGS?

Mom and Dad both had serious drinking problems, Mom's being by far the worse. Dad, though most of the time smashed out of his mind, at least through the grace of God, had always held a job. There was a roof over our heads and food on the table. Little else, but I was never one who wanted more than that. I prayed for sober loving parents. This was never to be, so I was just happy to come home from my mundane job and not have to pick one of them up from the floor. I told myself that I was selfish to want more from life than that.

Punishment came to me like a cold steel fist gripping my heart.

Mom and Dad had been left for road kill along the highway that ran in front of the small stucco house we called home. They had always been careful never to drink and drive. I have to hand it to them, they never broke that rule. Well, the truck driver that left them along the side of the road never had such a rule. He was found up the highway a few miles, wrapped around a hundred year old oak tree. He was as dead as the couple he left on the road.

Not owning the house left me out on the street. I couldn't afford to be picky. So I gave a security payment for the small ominous apartment.

The night I moved in was the first time I had noticed the door to my bedroom. You really couldn't see it that good until nightfall when the artificial light from the lamps fell across the door. There as if painted by the devil's hand was his self portrait. It was imbeded deep into the wood grain...several coats of varnish did not seem to diminish the clear explosive image.

That first night in the apartment the bedroom light kept flickering on and off. It seemed each time the light came on the demon image seemed to reach out further and further into the room. Fleeing in terror I was once again on the street.

The only safe harbor seemed to be a run down bar on the corner of the street. Not being a drinker, the first few drinks really hit me hard. I fell to the floor as soon as I let myself into the apartment. Was it my imagination, or did I really hear the demonic high pitched laughter coming from the bedroom? I awoke to the rain pelting on the dim, dirty windows. My mood was one of wanting to start a fight with someone, ...ANYONE...

My quite good natured demeanor seemed to be leaving me. I would look into the mirror in the morning and see an anxious, angry face staring back at me. I began to become frightened at WHAT and WHO I was becoming. I had started to drink myself into oblivion each night so that I could sleep without watching the devil in the door reaching out. Reaching for my SOUL.

I then saw Mom and Dad, standing in the corner of the bedroom weeping. They sadly looked at me, I could see agony in their faces. The AGONY of GUILT!

Coming to grips with myself I made the decision to go to the little church two blocks away instead of the bar on the corner. The LORD smiled on me that night I came through the doors. I met a wonderful man who walked the road to salvation with me. He saw the image on the bedroom door and prayed long and hard in front of it. Each day the image grew more faint, until it had completely disappeared. Was this the IMAGE of my SOUL? Was it showing me just how ugly a soul could become, when full of hatred and despair? I was leaving myself wide open for the devil to come into my life. This with the love of a God loving man has changed my life. Now I only see and feel the spirit of God, Love and goodness in my life.