I worked for Data General and ended up having 10 different jobs there in 6 years. I was a lot of firsts. I was the first woman forklift driver in shipping and receiving. I just mentioned that I wanted to learn, so they said, "Well, there's plenty of space here, go ahead and learn." So after hours I'd stay and try. I learned how to run the forklift and then I was doing it all the time.

I had always painted throughout my life, but I realized that was where my heart was...in the arts. So I looked throughout (Data General) for something I could apply the arts to. They had a group that did all the graphic work, but you really needed a degree for that, too. I was stuck. I could stay right where I was and be happy, which I wasn't, or get a degree. It was a big challenge. I didn't have the school skills, and it was changing my whole life, selling the possessions I'd gathered, starting over to go to school.

(My quilt) is a series of self-portraits that I've done throughout the year. I try to express what I'm experiencing in my life at the time of the portrait. This year was a lot of changes, very rapid changes. So doing the self-portraits helped me get through that year and keep in touch with myself. I've selected 16 portraits that I am sewing into the quilt.

Someone from Women's History called (seeking art for the Women's History poster). I went and showed them some of the pieces I'd been doing for my thesis...they picked out one and I modified it to work on the poster. I worked with the color separations, I worked with Publications...and now the posters are up around campus. It's enjoyable to see them, for it to have gone so well.

My mother says I painted in my crib and I used whatever medium I had. Then I went to crayons on the walls and lipstick on the mirror. It is a language that there are no words for. It's like expressing my life experiences and I don't have the words to express this.

Everyone is an artist and what they are doing is an art form expressing themselves. I express myself through paint and drawing and quilt-making...it's the same as if I was a doctor and healing people. A lot of people out there don't paint, (but) they're artists.

I figure there are so many restrictions in the world, the one place I don't have to have them is in my paintings.