This is my good friend Laura Cottingham. We've been having conversations like this for some time now.

I want to start by asking you how you came to understand yourself as an artist, how did you adopt that identity, what in your own life led you to this understanding of yourself?

I understood that I was an artist almost by accident. I was pushed into it at about age twenty-five. You have to understand, I came from the kind of family where the arts would never have been encouraged. They were West Indian immigrants, and immigrants of color are de-classed when they come here. They may have been middle class and upper class in Jamaica, but here they were de-classed into the working class. They didn't have time or energy to devote to what we might think of as life-affirming activities. They really had to focus on survival. They understood a lot about taste, like what kind of silverware and china to put on the table, but in terms of what books to read—I don't think that was what they were able to give me. They were not really culture-oriented. And I don't think they were unique in that way. The black middle class has not been involved with wealth accumulation long enough nor is it financially and socially secure enough that bohemianism and encouraging children to be artists is an option for them.