I remember when I gave Maria use of the Studio Barn in exchange for helping with animal care. It was 2006, there were three cows, 36 sheep, two barn cats, three goats, three dogs living at the farm, it was a mad, creative, out of control place. She was shy, quiet, sad it seemed to me, shut down in some way. She never smiled, hardly ever spoke.

She worked restoring houses during the day, she had left her art behind. At first, she would only come to the Studio at night, around 2 or 3 a.m., Rose would growl and I would look across the road from my bedroom and see the lights go on, I never heard a sound, she was always gone by daylight, I didn’t see or talk to her for months after she started making her art there, she was like a deer, she came silently and left silently. I couldn’t imagine how she slept or rested, I could see how important the Studio Barn was to her, she loved the space, she made it her own, it was hers from the first day, no longer mine.

I worried about her in the barn all night, I started leaving food for her inside of the Studio Barn. Cheese, chocolate, bread, and it was always gone in the morning. Like a cat. One evening, I was surprised to see her car outside of the Studio Barn in daylight, I took a deep breath – I was afraid of spooking or disturbing her, it was her space – and made some microwave popcorn.  I brought it over to the small barn, a steaming aluminum bowl.  Mother the Barn Cat was sitting inside of the Studio Barn by the fire, she and Maria had become good friends in the night, of course.  Mother, who never came inside a building, came inside the Studio Barn to sit by the fire and listen to the coyotes howling outside. Life with animals is such a journey of the heart sometimes.

I carried a tray, popcorn and tea, it was a cold night. I knocked on the door. Can I come in? Am I disturbing you? There was music playing in the background, some chanting, fabric was hanging all over the place, Maria looked happier than I had ever seen her, she asked me to come in, and we sat in the two overstuffed chairs that were in the barn, we ate our popcorn silently, munching, listening to the fire, Mother got restless and went outside to hunt, when we were done, Maria showed me the beautiful quilt she was working on, and I knew to look carefully at it, and then to leave and go back to the farmhouse.

We each said later that we were as comfortable with each other that night than we had ever been with anyone in our lives.

After that, I would leave food in the Studio Barn every weekday night and in the morning, there would be an empty tray left by the back door of the farmhouse. It was months before I talked with Maria again in the Studio Barn, but I knew it would happen again. The Studio Barn is special to me.