Mina J. Robinson, August 13, 1928--April 11, 2000
    by Annette Burfoot
 
 

    Meeting Mina was something of a magical experience. Frank (Burke) and I
had taken to presenting papers at the annual conference of Literature and
Film at Florida State University in Tallahassee each January. We would take
the cheapest flight possible out of Toronto, which often meant flying into
Orlando at six in the morning, picking up a rental car, and driving five
hours to the panhandle. We would then drive down to visit Bill and Mina in
Gainesville on our way to visit Frank's father in Fort Lauderdale. Hearty
Canadians desperate for the feeling of sun on our skin at that time of the
year, we often completed our trip with a quick visit to Key West! But I'll
never forget my introduction to Mina.

    We were pretty exhausted after the grueling flying/driving/conference
section of our journey when we arrived under Gainesville pines at Bill and
Mina's sprawling bungalow that reminded me of 1960s tv sitcoms of the
cocktail set. The house, formed from concrete, rises hardly at all from the
ground compared to the soaring trees that form a sort of roofed effect over
much of the city. This, combined with the ever-present Florida vegetation
trying to reclaim everything, makes the house seem hobbit-home like, only
tiny glimpses of what's possibly inside through narrow and high slit windows
from the front. Inside, the space quickly opens up into large living and tv
rooms overlooking the screened and roofed pool. Though spacious, this area,
including the pool, is always dim because of those trees and the architectural
intent to shade away the Florida summer sun. I had never seen a dark pool so
much a part of a home before. The carpet was shag and the bathroom we used
had two sinks side by side--just like in the 1960s tv suburban world.
But for cave-loving hobbits.

    Before you arrived in the cavernous living areas, you passed through the
kitchen narrows and here was where I met Mina. She was presiding over
preparations for a delicious smelling, welcoming meal. Her beaming round face
immediately found mine and greeted me with offers of drinks and something to
eat, and an eager interest in my conference paper. I'll never know if Mina
would have been so enthusiastic about what I did if mine had not been an
interest in cultural representations of feminism and science. Mina was a
scientist and worked at the University of Florida Biology Department. She was
also discovering her potential as an artist, was exploring spirituality and
feminism. There were thirty years between us, and I have become accustomed
to meeting women from my mother's generation who have just found feminism
and can hardly contain their enthusiasm and new found critical abilities that
make so much sense of their life. (This sounds arrogant--I went through the
same thing but at a younger age, that's all). So I wasn't surprised when
Mina's exuberance quickly filled our discussions of women's lot in life over
the kitchen counter. This electric connection was established in the first
half hour of entering the house and lasted throughout our relationship.

    During this intense introduction, I remember Mina bending down to sweep
her beloved little Duffy (a Yorkshire terrier) onto the counter for his
insulin shot. Bill and Mina, both adoring dog-people of Duffy, had unique
relationships to him: Bill had devised a sort of ramp of pillows up to the
couch in the tv room so that Duffy, getting on in life and a fragile diabetic,
could easily scramble up and down. Bill would throw a little stuffed, cloth toy
for Duffy from the couch into the living room. Duffy would scoot after it, bring
it back to Bill, and, well, hump the toy as Bill held onto it. Bill explained to me
how the dog took pleasure this way. Mina, on the other hand, would take care
of Duffy in other ways. She would administer all of his considerable medications
(I seem to remember something was wrong with his skin and eyes as well).
She carefully fed him and made sure he was walked, etc. And she did those
insulin injections on the kitchen counter while excitedly debating feminist
issues with me. And that was incredible.

    I am what is called a dog person. I am totally over-identified with my
own pooch (Oscar, now a very disabled golden retriever) and have a pretty
good relationship with just about every dog I meet. Duffy, all four pounds of
him, totally terrified me. I only tried to pet him once and ended up with the
worst dog bite of my life. His one quick bite pierced my hand to the bone
leaving me with a wound that took ages to heal. My estimation of Mina rose
considerably as I watched her administer to this hairy and dangerous fury. I
think she took some pride in this unique relationship that translated into
some form of domestic power.

    In contrast to the rest of the house, our bedroom, Mina's study and
studio, was incredibly bright. We slept on a pull-out couch that Mina would
watch tv from when she wanted to see something different from what Bill was
watching in the tv room. She spoke of "her" movies. Crystals dangled in the
windows and various examples of popular southwestern art and crafts filled
the shelves. There were books on Native American spirituality, coffee-table
texts of various natural realms, and feminism. I was always surprised to see
no sign of her art-in-progress or pots of brushes and paints anywhere as I
presumed this was where she worked. She always seemed eager to point to
beauty except her own.

    Eventually, on a subsequent visit, we had a sort of showing of her
paintings (water colour mostly) in the living room (it was one of the few
moments we spent any time in that part of the house). Mina had just started
to exhibit her work at this point and we offered to buy two of her paintings:
one from her unframed pieces and the other, a framed image of a stormy beach
hanging in the dining area. This generated a moment of uncertainty between
all four of us. Mina had to determine a value to her work and also to consider
our request to take away one of her paintings that she clearly liked herself.
After a few moments Mina decided both a price and to release the framed piece.
We duly paid, she gave us a receipt, and Bill remarked how Mina
had just sold more paintings than some famous painter, van Gogh I believe,
who had only ever sold one painting during his lifetime. Next time we
visited, Mina announced that she was not going to sell any more of her
paintings as she wasn't doing her art to make money. (She had just retired
from the University of Florida at this time). Although she didn't go much
further than that in her announcement, I sensed there was something profound
in what she was saying that had to do with the financial mediation of
friendship, a mediation she was rejecting.

        During other visits Mina took Frank and me on tours of a local health
food grocery store (we had never seen one so large before), extolling the
healthful virtues of various supplements and vitamins. She also took all of
us, including Bill and Duffy, for a wonderful trip to Cedar Key, a west coast
port near Gainesville that used to be one of the largest in America as it
ferried goods between South America and the Northeast before the opening of
the Panama Canal. It was also the source of lead pencils for most of the US
in the 19th and early 20th centuries. It has now become an artists' colony and
Mina wanted us to experience why. The area is both rich in cultural history and
filled with a natural beauty and clearly delighted Mina. It was one of the places
that inspired her artwork. Each Christmas, Mina would send us a beautiful card
that celebrated nature and usually supported a charity in aid of nature- based concerns.

    Mina was the enthusiastic homemaker in the Robinson household, and I use
the term "homemaker" with utmost and feminine regard. She was generous with
her time, insights (especially in terms of her inter-personal relationships),
and with things that she knew would give others pleasure. She had begun
asserting herself within a much larger social and natural world when she was
diagnosed with brain cancer. Her 1999 Christmas card carried the exciting
news that she had planned a trip to India for the new millennium. I can only
imagine how this would have stimulated her imagination and exuberant curiosity.
And every time I look at her paintings in my home and my office, I
see her sensitive and intelligent gaze upon the world around her as a form of
prayer. In her work, reproduced below, the heavy dark clouds, pregnant with
rain and hanging over the sensual curves of pink sand, emit a sublime
experience of a complete sensory connection between soul and other.
Thanks Mina.

        Painting by Mina Robinson