This is the third and final piece that was accepted into Creative Tension at the Perkins Center for the Arts.
Liminal: the word comes from Latin “limen,” which means “threshold”. One might be in a transitional place or in the first stage of a new phase in one’s life. A liminal space can also be sacred. It is in its simplest form, it is the space in between. Liminal space is the space and time between the events which define us and leave a permanent mark on our heart.
Thus the 211 days my dad spent in the hospital became his liminal space. It was also the liminal space for myself, my mom and my brothers. The 7 months he spent at Jefferson Hospital and at Good Shepherd Penn Partners was a time of uncertainty for all of us. We desperately held on to hope that my dad would get better and come home. In fact, each day was its own liminal space trapped within a larger context. Each day could have its own set of victories and/or setbacks. There were times when curve balls were thrown our way, when the rug was pulled out from under our feet. These were the defining moments within the threshold of our liminal space. My mom would often say “we are a family interrupted”. We were a family in hiatus, waiting for my dad to finally be able to come home.
My dad’s 7 months in the hospital became his liminal space. This time was also his transition between life and death. Except none of us knew this at the time.
For this drawing, I explored this specific time of our lives (August 2013 through March 2014) while my dad was hospitalized. Each shape represents a person, moment or event during our collective liminal space. For example, the white rectangle at the bottom left symbolizes my dad. The rectangle mimics the shape of his hospital bed. The curved line coming from the left side of this shape stands for the drain and tube that was connected to my dad’s abdomen for his entire hospitalization. This drawing is symbolic of the liminal space that my family and I experienced as my dad made the transition from this world.