“I shoved all the dishes aside,
put my journal down on the table in
front of Nancy, handed her my pen,
and did what I always do when we’re
together: asked her to write her name.
You see, once upon a decade, when
we lived closer and I could spend
more time with her, I had Nancy
writing at an end-of-fi rst grade level,
and I like to check the erosion of her
skill through lack of attention and
practice. Nancy wrote N-A-N ... then
the ‘cy’ dribbled off down the page.
I looked up at my friend and said,
‘This is the signature of a woman in
menopause. Her identity is changing,
and she doesn’t know who she is
anymore.’
“Nancy picked up a pen and
held it above the journal indicating
she wanted me to turn to a clean,
fresh page and, with that, she began
drawing. She fi lled the rest of the
blank pages in my journal, then in my
friend’s journal, and then she drew
on napkins we handed her. I called
my husband that night and said, ‘Two
things you need to know: First, this
woman-child never rides in anything
but a convertible again. Judging by
the smile that took over her face and
didn’t let go, the sensory experience
is amazing for her. And second, I will
be bringing back out my cloth and
thread.’”
Jeanne has been working on
Nancy’s “scribbles” ever since; almost
fi ve years now. Referring to Nancy’s
scribbles, Jeanne explains, “I stitch
every one of them. Every. Single.
One.”
On monthly visits, Jeanne drops
off art supplies to Nancy. She says, “I
now keep Nancy supplied in paper—
dropping off 10 reams or so every
visit—and drawing utensils. Nancy
prefers crayons. (Because Nancy has
so few choices in life), I keep a big,
brightly colored lidded box available
for her, and I keep it fi lled with
drawing utensils of every hue so she
can at least choose what she wants
to use to make her marks and what
color she wants her marks to be.”
Jeanne has observed a distinct
purposefulness in Nancy’s artistic
expression. “After about a year,
Nancy began to make deliberate color
choices. I mean, she was making
them all along even though it doesn’t
look like it to the casual observer
because sometimes she doesn’t
even look directly in the box whenchoosing but trust me: this woman
misses nothing, and I do mean
nothing. Now she’s using one, two, or
even three colors on the same page.”
Because of the volume of material
Nancy produces, the seemingly
random marks on a surface are
organized in series by Jeanne.
So far they’ve created a trove of
hieroglyphic-like pages on various
fabric panels. In IOOL Series 1, there
are 167 drawings; in IOOL Series
2, 454 drawings; and in Series 3,
271 drawings done twice! Series
3 was hand stitched on 90"-round
tablecloths, and on the fi rst pass