Tina w/ New Tattoo, Pigeon Hill, 1991

“I was young and didn’t have a care in the world. The new tattoo was to cover up 3 tattoos—initials of former boyfriends, mistakes, should I say? I was pregnant but didn’t know it then. I had a miscarriage right after this picture was taken. I was with Buddy Fielder. We got in a fight at Third Base Lounge. It was his jealousy. He punched me—broke my nose. They locked him up and he got out the next day at noon. We met on the street and started arguing. I pulled out my sheath knife and stabbed him in the shoulder. Someone knocked the knife out of my hand and the police took me away.”

Tina after the Fire, Middle Way House, 2013

“The last couple weeks have been rough. On June 1, Dwayne started drinking and he kept bitching to me about the car. A couple of guys helped me with a flat tire and he got jealous. He was mad and set fire to the curtains in our mobile home in Lawrence Hollow. We tried to put them out but they spread and we lost the mobile home. I lost my mom’s belongings that she left me when she died—even her false teeth and glasses. I lost my photographs—all my possessions. I never saw it coming.”