Fight or Flight: The Neighbors Are Fighting Again
In April of 2025 I was visiting my hometown in the Dominican Republic, we stayed at a friend’s apartment in Punta Cana which was full of paintings on the walls. I remember my friend’s mother had painted for many years, so this was expected. I was surrounded by these works for the entire week I was there, but one of them had something that just kept pulling me in. This painting featured a cityscape at dusk in warm blues and greens, something that already felt out of place in this Caribbean setting, but there was this speck of red in it that I couldn’t stop noticing every time i walked by it. Was it a mistake? Did she do it on purpose? If so, why? Was there a meaning this splash of red? It was very small but the contrast made it feel enormous, at least it did so in my mind. The last night before leaving the DR to come back to Spain, I sat down on my computer to create my daily piece, as I always do at around 9-10pm. That red was still haunting me, so I said “fuck it, that’s today’s piece” and proceeded to create my interpretation of it.
I saw the red as if it was something coming out of the window, not as an object but as a beam of energy, really intense energy. So I exaggerated the idea to create the piece ‘the neighbors are fighting again’. Anyone who has lived in an apartment building has had to listen to their neighbors arguing and fighting, so with this title I finally offloaded this painting from my mind. I posted it, and went to bed. On my way up the stairs I hit the light switch to turn the lights off for the night but something weird happened. The lights wouldn’t turn off. Flip the switch up… on. Flip the switch down… on. I tried all the switches in the house and there was no way to turn them off. The switch had worked perfectly all week but that night something happened and the lights simply would not turn off. This made me reflect on the piece I had made, an apartment at night with a massive beam of light coming out of it, ‘cool synchronicity’ I thought. The next morning, the light was off and the switch worked normally. Weird. So I called my friend up and told him the whole story, and that he should show the piece I made to his mom since she’d probably get a kick out it. He goes, “My mom didn’t make that painting, it was my stepfather who painted it” and that freaked the fuck out of me. His stepdad was a good friend of mine, we worked together for a while and would meet for dinner all the time. He had passed away in 2020 after I had moved away from DR, he lived in that apartment for many years before my friend inherited it. What had felt like a ‘cool synchronicity’ the night before turned into something more significant. I interpreted it as him acknowledging my tribute to his painting, and messing with me through the lights that wouldn’t turn off. I remembered the movie ‘Enter the Void’ where lightbulbs act as entry and exit points for consciousness, and The Tibetan Book of the Dead where consciousness passes through states of pure light. I wasn’t around the island when he passed, so this felt like a way of him connecting with me. I’m sure there is a materialistic explanation to all of it, but I prefer to believe I had a real experience with an old friend’s spirit, with our artwork as the catalyst. Since last week I had been pondering about which piece to release as the final one, I sketched and played with many ideas, and made a selection that felt appropriate. Then, in a moment of clarity, yesterday I remembered this piece and that exactly one year had passed since the experience, so it became very obvious that this would be the one. To the handful of folks that made it all the way down here, thank you. This is the first time I’ve taken the time to write this story, and it has brought a lot of emotions back from that night.
Much love.
mendezmendez, digital mixed media, 2025
