Collage in progress

Here are two details from my collage-in-progress, a big (36"x24") canvas incorporating image mosaic, traditional collage composition (using paper and fabric), and acrylic paint (click on the images to see bigger versions). The collage shows tired men in a medical office waiting room (not pictured here), women worrying (together and alone), and other images connected to the U.S. crisis in health coverage. My main sources of imagery for the large figures are depression-era photos from the WPA and U.S. health service agencies, and for the mosaic components I am using tiny bits of posters from countries that have socialized healthcare. The big idea is that, in spite of what Republicans and too many Democrats say, socialized health sounds mighty fine (sounds like a human right, even!) to the millions of people in the U.S. whose access to doctors, nurses, hospitals, and medicines is criminally, unconscionably limited by a system tilted toward profit for insurance companies. End of speech. (But, hey, Obama, please listen up! I sure want you to win--*and* I want you to do something big and responsible about the healthcare mess we're living in. Please, no halfway measures.)

The photo below shows my new use for my mini-muffin tin--as a sorting tray for image mosaic pieces (Elliot's collage-in-progress is underneath everything). I had this idea a couple of years ago that I'd start making mini-muffins at dinner time (instead of regular-sized muffins) because they bake faster. But they don't bake all that well, at least in our oven, and they aren't as satisfying as a nice big muffin that you can slice in half and butter. (We really like muffins with dinner at our house. I make them probably twice a week, often with Bisquick, but sometimes from scratch. I usually dump a baby-food jar of squash, carrots, prunes, or some other vitamin and fiber-rich goop into the bowl. The whole process, from light-bulb-over-Mom's-head to dinner table, takes less than 25 minutes, and we often have enough left over for breakfast the next morning.)

This is one area in which I truly do feel like one of those cookin', nursin', husband-pleasin' women I read about in my mother's early-1970's copy of La Leche League's cookbook Mother's in the Kitchen. (I love, love, love that old cookbook. I especially like reading the lengthy section on the importance of including organ meats in the family diet, as well as the zillion and one uses listed for creamy canned soups. No, I don't make those recipes, but I have *very* happy memories of eating that stuff--especially the recipe for "Glory-Fried Chicken." Thanks, Mom!) Though I never attended an LLL meeting when I was a nursing mother (all the meetings were while I was at work....what's up with that?), I can't tell you how many I attended as a kid (my mom was an LLL group leader in Denver). Between two kids, I spent five and a half lovely years as a nursing mother. Hurray for the lessons of La Leche League!