Little Boxes.

"Little boxes on the hillside, little boxes made of ticky tacky, little boxes on the hillside, the boxes all the same. There's a green one, and a pink one, and a blue one, and a yellow one, and they're all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same. And people in the houses all went to the Universities, where they were put in boxes and came out all the same.  There's Doctors,  there's Lawyers, and Business Executives, and you're all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same..."

This was my mother's lullaby to me as I remember it best. She would add a little extra punch to the lyric's "And they're all made out ticky tacky and they all look just the same!" She could never fit that mold. Even when there were times where she longed for the house in suburbia and to be taken care of. Her anger at what she deserved and didn't get, sometimes over flowed into jealousy to her friends that did. She never saw herself as a cleaning lady in an elementary school, but as a woman who held a secret to the woman who was the cleaning lady in an elementary school. The secret she beheld, the fact she desired to be bigger than life on stage. In the basement on Dellwood St., ironing the kids clothes, her heart and soul poured out of her voice into the cloud of steam and starch. Me, holding a flashlight on her while she sang into the extension cord. She sometime sat on a paint dripped stool, swooning her attentive crowd of one, Edie Gourmet or Dione Warwick ballads.

Ok, the truth is I cringed sometimes at those sour notes. And all the opera singing lessons she had in high school had certainly taught her to how belt it out. Somewhere lost inside the years that passed by, the dream still had a fire in it. Perhaps in church where she could legitimately over power those church ladies. I would lip sync next to her amazed at her courage. In a moment caught up in my mother's fantasy world, I was drawn in as a pupil. A song in mist and starch, don't dream it just be it. Sometimes I forget where my core is and my notes are unmistakably sour, but as an artist I draw my notes out onto paper, and in paint to canvas. For a moment I am transported to a New York City loft and getting ready for my opening night. So many canvas so little time.

I'm the Momma, the Aunt, the Sister, Cousin, Friend and Lover, but ultimately I sing out of tune, always from my heart, and a with a very long extension cord.

Love you Mom, Donna