Confirmation
Erica's father was a Nazi soldier and her paintings are full of skeletons.
Skull heads, and day of the dead Basquiatish death scenes; they are full with paint, and collage, and fierce.
I adore her work.
They are beautiful somehow.
Erica is in her seventies now, with white roots peeping under fire-dyed hair, stabbing at the air in all directions. She wears constumes, gloriously loud colors, has an old Dacsund named Bingy, and has been married forever. For six years, I taught art to kids at the art center where her studio is located, and we saw each other in passing. We knew the same people, and we always spoke briefly, heavily accented, kind words issuing from her, but she was always on her way to something; rushing.
Last year I saw her at my friend's opening and she had no hair, wore a head wrap. Cancer, and doesn't look good, said my friend. I didn't get a chance to talk to Erica that day.
A few nights ago I dreamt about her. I was wandering, ghostly. in the hallway outside of her studio, and her paintings hung on the walls all around me. Her door was closed, and I worriedly asked passersby if she was alive. Is Erica all right, I called, is she still making paintings? Is Erica here? No one answered.
The next day, I went shopping, and came out of Whole Foods to blustery wind, bags everywhere, hair whipping. Fixed on my car, I moved quickly to get my things inside. And there, doing the very same thing, parked right next to me was Erica.
I don't know if she believed me when I told her I dreamt about her last night and wildly threw my arms around her three times. I'm so happy you're alive, I yelled. I was sick, and now I'm better, she grinned, hugging me back. And here's Bingy, she pointed, as he sat on the driver's seat with stumpy legs and a greying muzzle.
Her hair was red and thick and jagged, and as we drove away, waving to each other one last time, she in her purple glitter sunglasses, I felt like we had both recovered from something.
Erica's father was a Nazi soldier and her paintings are full of skeletons.
Skull heads, and day of the dead Basquiatish death scenes; they are full with paint, and collage, and fierce.
I adore her work.
They are beautiful somehow.
Erica is in her seventies now, with white roots peeping under fire-dyed hair, stabbing at the air in all directions. She wears constumes, gloriously loud colors, has an old Dacsund named Bingy, and has been married forever. For six years, I taught art to kids at the art center where her studio is located, and we saw each other in passing. We knew the same people, and we always spoke briefly, heavily accented, kind words issuing from her, but she was always on her way to something; rushing.
Last year I saw her at my friend's opening and she had no hair, wore a head wrap. Cancer, and doesn't look good, said my friend. I didn't get a chance to talk to Erica that day.
A few nights ago I dreamt about her. I was wandering, ghostly. in the hallway outside of her studio, and her paintings hung on the walls all around me. Her door was closed, and I worriedly asked passersby if she was alive. Is Erica all right, I called, is she still making paintings? Is Erica here? No one answered.
The next day, I went shopping, and came out of Whole Foods to blustery wind, bags everywhere, hair whipping. Fixed on my car, I moved quickly to get my things inside. And there, doing the very same thing, parked right next to me was Erica.
I don't know if she believed me when I told her I dreamt about her last night and wildly threw my arms around her three times. I'm so happy you're alive, I yelled. I was sick, and now I'm better, she grinned, hugging me back. And here's Bingy, she pointed, as he sat on the driver's seat with stumpy legs and a greying muzzle.
Her hair was red and thick and jagged, and as we drove away, waving to each other one last time, she in her purple glitter sunglasses, I felt like we had both recovered from something.
posted by powdermonkey at 7:59 AM
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