Blankets

“Craig was hogging all the blankets!”

When Craig and his brother Phil are young, they share the same bed. The opening scene of the graphic novel sees the two boys arguing and wrestling over the blankets on a cold winter night. Their authoritarian father booms upstairs and disciplines them by taking Phil to the cubby hole, a dark and dirty hole in the wall. The experience ends up traumatizing both boys, and Craig frequently looks back on it with guilt for not taking responsibility when his brother tried to explain that Craig was hogging the blankets.

“I know your mother and she’s a good Christian lady and she would be disgusted with this. She would be disgusted with YOU.”

Craig is constantly plagued with guilt over his religious background and the way his ideas and hobbies conflict with traditional Christian teachings. Furthermore, he is bullied by his parents, babysitter, peers, and teachers. When his teacher discovers a drawing he made of his bullies eating excrement, she disciplines and embarrasses him in front of the entire class. This incident sets the precedent for many more incidents involving Craig’s religion instilling guilt within him.

“As a child, I thought that life was the most horrible world anyone could ever live in, and that there HAD to be something better.”

Craig’s childhood was mainly composed of stress, guilt, and fear over an eternity in hell. He was bullied, ostracized, and pressured into a belief system that he could not fully understand or relate with, and one which caused him more fear than joy.