I feel a diary post coming on.

Monday 01.09.25

It's Elly's turn again.

We've each had our first day, our individual day. Victoria, and Abi, cry when they come in and see themselves and their family projected huge on the wall. Adam is grateful. Darren looks sexy in his montage. I find watching mine hard. Below, look at how much Ciaron looks like his nana.

We're back to Elly's. She begins us. We as a group are going to help her unpack what she said on her individual day. Plus what her mind-map is showing us. First we absorb her montage, huge on the wall. She takes us through her hairstyles.

We go to lunch. We're coming back from lunch when Adam goes to HOME's front desk to see if there is another room, other than the gallery, we can have for the afternoon, so Elly's unpacking is private. I go to the loo. I come back. What has happened? 'Adam, what has happened?' The colour has drained from his face.

A person behind the counter — a welcoming visitor person who won't be named — has said to Adam, 'Look at me when you're talking to me.' Adam with 4 degrees, a professorship and an exhibition underway will have thought he is safe in this environment. But obviously he isn't. WOW! What the fuck? WOW! Why would that prick say that? I get Adam to repeat it. They all repeat it. It is only short of the word boy at the end. You fucking bastard. It goes, though, with the way I feel HOME is treating us. With the way we are being treated. Why are we being treated so badly? Marketing is a beg. The montage works sometimes. The playlist works sometimes. It always feels like I am in the way when I ask. Not any more. Not fucking any more. Escalate it.

Tuesday 02.09.25

It is short. It is sweet. It is vinegary. I start with Adam. But I give them the rest. I have to give CEO Karen O'Neil her due, she is waiting for us when we arrive. She asks what happened. There is a little edge in her voice telling me that it isn't a racist attack. I back off. Adam moves forward in his write up, which is nothing like my write up. It is to the point. But emotive. And leaves no room, but, yes, it is a racist attack. The world becomes brighter. Nothing we ask for is too much. Marketing meet with us. We have a system to make sure the montage doesn't cut out. And the relevant playlist is playing.

They'll make a perspex cover for Adam's books in the ghost of the consultation room we have recreated where the Irish cleaner finds Adam's kinky black hairs in the sink, and asks his supervisor to ask him to clean them up each day before he leaves. It is Adam's day. He confesses: that after that incident he would find himself cleaning his home sink with extra care; he now realises he was probably passing on his anxiety to his sons; and how angry he feels about the white psychologists who didn't back him up to keep their beautiful office. We are unanimous in escalating it.

Adam is crying. Our back-up; his personal memories; our genuine interest in his journey. Bent into the hankies he weeps. We are silent. Grateful to see, feel, the crack between his professional and his private life and the human gently oozing out.

Wednesday 03.09.25

It is my turn. I've got the most graceful first mind-map. Me with my heart intact in the middle of my picture. I've been meditating for an hour every morning for 36 years. I don't know how it happens. She did enter a practise mind-map 10 days ago. I draw her even though she makes no sense. Then I forget. Now I am telling them about Pauline stabbing Ivan. He didn't die then but he never sees the light of day again. I am 6 months pregnant. I have a caesarean abortion cos I don't want to pull the story through my life. Here it is. My ghost. I have been ignoring for 50 years. It is lurking under my beautiful picture. Sobbing. I sit broken.

Thursday 04.09.25

Mesmerisingly — we've never been this quiet — Darren unpacks his life on the sofa. Their mum and son global play Susan and Darren, produced by Quarantine, cauterises Darren's family's pain. Composting it into fertiliser.

Now Susan is Mother Theresa. They own their house together. Darren treats his man. His 2nd mind-map puts him and his husband to be, whoever he is, on a cake with white top hats. Darren's has a veil.

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2010/may/09/susan-and-darren-quarantine-jennings

Friday 05.09.25

They've come for a Ghosts in the Nursery workshop. Black, white, plus self defined half-caste, child psychologists. Sierra Leone R admits her mum and dad gave them white names for the purpose of job applications. It leads us to disembarking beautifully dressed West Indians in white gloves on the Windrush boats. Delusional. Believing no one will know they're black. M says, while training to be a doctor he almost persuades himself he is white. L tells how her white family request her big hair be straightened if she is gonna remain a bridesmaid. She says as she is leaving, you remind me of P. Do you know P? With W? P and W. We could help people mixed-race people like P and W if we presented as who we really are, just with some additional skills. Exactly the conversation I have just had with R. How many Sierra Leone women would love talking to you, a woman who gets them from every angle. They don't get it the two older white women when I point and say, you look like my mum. One touches her chest. How could she? You look dead like my mum when she was older. No, that's impossible. Delusional. Someone like me can't give birth to someone like you. And the jury is out on the blonde girl who is crying because her treasured mixed-race sister-in-law may not have been acting like her true self all these years. Though, she corrects herself: that may not be the case — she may have been comfortable.

It's been a big week.