"La, La, La. . .,"

"La, La, La. . .," Acrylic on Canvas, Painting 1999

2000 Cash Award Winner

19th Women Artists: A Celebration

An Annual Exhibition in Support of the YWCA

Youngstown, Ohio

One of two paintings created for the following narrative:

Muriel wrestled with her restlessness determined to curb it by drinking decaffienated coffee. In a manic, hyperactive fit she decided to eat herself into oblivion; to take one last attempt at piecing her life together or retching it apart. She wrangled with a one pound fruit cake, during her soap opera to no avail. The fruit cake won out and Muriel was left wearing her fuzzie slippers, gagging and gasping for breath chanting, ". . . oh, we love the old one. . .", exhausted and exasperated by this useless attempt at suicide. Meaning could not be ascertained by forcefully reaching the other side through candied fruits and nuts. No, Muriel was made of sterner stuff. And if one could overdose on fruitcake would it not be just as easy to succumb to a twelve pack of Hostess "Ho Ho's', lard notwithstanding, or a box of Little Debbie's 'fudge rounds' with hydrogenated oils!

Muriel realized that she was at a quandry. Every direction that she turned only pulled her deeper into the depths of disparaging. She felt as if she were walking through quicksand or breakdancing on a mine field. Muriel decided to pack her bags and leave; evaporating into the humid August air, travelling west-bound to anywhere outside the middle west or bust! She left no note, only the remainder of the fruit cake in a lump upon her lover's pillow; pock-marked and punctuated from her gnawing. She was certain that he would find this soggy mutilated mass of fruits and nuts rousingly erotic and lie awake all night anticipating the climatic conclusion of this seduction. She did not care that he would lose sleep over it, she knew that it was time to go. . .