My heart has always been deeply moved by color, design, and beauty. My mother’s graceful movements looking in the mirror and shaping her hair into a French roll with tortoise shell hair clips. The burgundy-and-white-striped wallpaper of my living room. The colorful ivory balls dancing on the green felt pool table. Rainbow-colored oil in the water of a Brooklyn gutter. The red blood trickling out of the collapsed horses mouth, steaming on the black asphalt avenue in Brooklyn to the smell of broken-potted deep orange geraniums at 6. The giant, towering cow in the cul de sac morning with chestnut brown hair leaving me speechless at 9. Judy’s shiny dancing leotards dashing through MacDougal Street in the West Village at 25. The red grand piano Ringo painted for Peter Max in his Manhattan studio at 60.

A major impact came from the meditative contemplative world. Meditating under the guidance of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche since 1974. The beauty of the Japanese nature color world. The indigenous tipis, blankets, bowls, and designs of the Lakota and Navajo worlds. The rich pantheon of Tibetan art.

Creativity has always been central. Crayon peach trees on my white bedroom walls at 2. Playing guitar and piano at 18, then writing and singing songs ever since. Six screen plays over the course of 50 years. The communicative spaciousness of Dharma Art, expressed in ikebana, bugaku and playing the hichiriki in a gagaku orchestra. Touching my first brush at Naropa University at 45, under the tutelage of the Tibetan thangka painter, Sanje Elliott, and contemporary contemplative painters, Bob Spellman and Joan Anderson. That’s when the painting really began.

I’ve dedicated my adult life to helping others through teaching and sharing what has inspired and helped me. Teaching elementary school and numerous meditation programs around the world for 40 years. Always surrounded by children (or women with children) my whole life. And then honored to be a guest artist, teaching meditation and painting, at the University of New Mexico at 64.