Brenda was a tremendous life inspiration and a source of unsurpassed confidence in my life as an artist. She was perhaps the most important person in influencing me in my dedication to art. Brenda believed in me like no one else. Once, she told me, as I can best recall, so the weren’t her exact words, but as close as i can remember, “rodney, I rarely tell this to students, but, I think you have what it takes to really make it as a painter/artist. What I think is that you should finish college, then pack up, move to new york, and starve for a while, because I think that you can really make it.” Wow, I have carried those words with me all of my life since. Brenda was brilliant, she believed in me, encouraged me and inspired me. I hoped to someday really make it as an artist, and then contact her to thank her for teaching me with such passion. Unfortunately, I did not take her advice, much to my regret, because my father would not allow, and thought the idea rediculous.
Brenda was a very sweet woman with tremenous talent. I think of her everytime that i draw, sketch, or paint. The world is certainly amiss without her to inspire and teach. I wish that I would have tried to contact her earlier, before she died. She is a great loss to the world of art and education. I am very saddened at this news.
Brenda, thank you for all of your dedication to art and art students. You were, and still are one of the biggest inspirations of my entire life.
with love,
rodney maraist
I will miss you

Chelone (Greek mythology)
From Wikipedia
In Greek mythology, Chelone was a nymph or a mortal woman who was changed into a tortoise by the gods. “Khelônê” means “tortoise” in Greek, and the tortoise was a symbol of silence in ancient times[citation needed].

The main source for the myth of Chelone is Servius’s commentary on Virgil’s Aeneid, where Chelone is a nymph transformed by Hermes for refusing to attend the wedding of Hera and Zeus.

“For his wedding with Juno [Hera], Jupiter [Zeus] ordered Mercurius [Hermes] to invite all the gods, the men and the animals to the wedding. Everyone invited by Mercurius [Hermes] came, except for Chelone who did not deign to be there, mocking the wedding. When Mercurius noticed her absence, he went back down to the earth, threw in the river the house of Chelone that was standing over the river and changed Chelone in an animal that would bear her name. Chelone is said testudo (tortoise) in Latin.” [1]

Certain parts of the myth[citation needed] tell that Chelone was taking too long to be ready for the feast, which caused Zeus to become angry. In retribution, he crashed her house over her, and thus condemned her to drag her house forever as a tortoise.

Although Chelone’s transformation was not mentioned in sources other than Servius, what is clearly a version of the same myth is found in Aesop’s Fables, where the main character is a tortoise to begin with, but does not initially have a shell:

“Zeus invited all the animals to his wedding. The tortoise alone was absent, and Zeus did not know why, so he asked the tortoise (khelone) her reason for not having come to the feast. The tortoise said, ‘Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home.’ Zeus got angry at the tortoise and ordered her to carry her house with her wherever she went.”

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