Thank you.
The 8th of May was a hell of a day when the Great Titanic sank away.
I was introduced to the Mississippi Delta and I heard that hand-bwned song.
Maybe ten years later I married Elizabeth Holland Thompson, born in Greenville.
She was an artist.
She learned to draw watching her dad sign his name.
She loved it.
He was not very creative, but his wife, Joy, was.
Holly got the best of both.
Her daughter Elizabeth and I were the beneficiaries.
Art has been in my life forever.
My mom was an accomplished artist and no doubt I have to give her credit for helping me catch Holly.
Never a day went by that those two were not busy, hunched over some project,
always working over some painting, dress or costume.
It's hard to imagine someone whose eyes, fingers and creative mind could be so connected.
Sure, she was a painter, landscapes, abstract pastels, portraits,
full painting on walls and doors and molding.
No professional was going to paint her kitchen cabinets.
If she was not painting, she worked on logos, my own including.
Costumes?
Holly loved to make Elizabeth's fun costumes for every event.
That little child and her mom had such fun dressing up.
Once Elizabeth entered school, Holly got back to painting.
Portraits became such a challenge.
She had this gift to capture personality.
She adored painting children between infancy and purity.
She whispered one day that a portrait was going so well.
It was finished in a week.
That little child was so precious and sweet.
Remember the last one took two months?
Well, it was clear to me what she meant.
She never would say something unkind.
She quit painting portraits one day with a waiting list of 20.
It's just not fun anymore.
Not long after that, she found a perfect home.
She recognized the potential for a studio downstairs.
It was quiet, private and filled with light.
And in that studio, she found the independence every artist needs.
She painted three or four canvases at a time.
She drew and she practiced.
Her horizons expanded into flower decoration,
blue ribbon quality.
She's gone.
But even in her last years, she found more art.
She began and finished a calligraphy career featured
in a national magazine.
Her mind could tell her hand how to twist and twirl an ink pen
in such ways as to create whatever look her client wanted.
An autograph to English letters?
Sure, how about this?
Then out of oxygen, her stair climbing days were over.
And she found a perfect place on the porch
and began designing and working needle points.
Once more, to the end, her mind and her eyes
and her fingers told it all.
I missed them all.
Firstly, Elizabeth and I miss her warm and loving heart.
