I met Judy Chicago, a brilliant feminist and multiple instrument artist, in the late 90s. I admired her work enormously and the director of the women's studies program knew this and asked me to drive Ms Chicago to our university from her hotel for a faculty dinner.
I don't remember much about our talk, her lecture or the dinner. I was starstruck and imagined her as a cougar with a barrage of young lovers (imagined being operative here yall), painting in the sun and listening to Natalie Merchant or some other Lilith Fair music. I contemplated her giant installment piece, The Dinner Party, with absolute awe. I wanted to sculpt, to protest, to sing and write and live such eccentrics as Frida Kahlo and the other women who beat the path for me.
Today I sat in my high rise apartment looking at a gothic church out my tenth floor window, questioning myself about how I'd lived up to my dreams from college.
I concluded that my life has been one adventure after the other--not one tragedy following the other--as I once believed. I have relished every good moment, learned from the bad and I have become very altruistic and empowering to myself and others. I raised woke, socially active kids. No regrets my friends. No regrets.
Izzy