did she have time to dream? (7 January 2016)

Last year I found a small post-it lying on the floor at work.
It said,
Did she have time to dream?

A question, I thought, redolent of both anxiety and hope.

How To by Marise Maas, 2011, oil on canvas, 75cm – 100cm
Interview in The Design Files

What people around the world dream about (The Atlantic)


Butterfly McQueen was born today in 1911.  

As my ancestors are free from slavery, I am free from the slavery of religion.

- Butterfly McQueen

She didn't like her role in Gone with the Wind,
"Most of my friends were progressive, going forward and looking forward. It was depressing for me"
but reconciled herself to it because it acknowledged the history of black slavery.

"We've got to know more about where we've come from. I wasn't too happy about the whole thing, but also later in life, as I looked around, I decided to take what I could get and then use it for what I want to do."  

She dedicated her later life to "the black family"

Butterfly McQueen dies at 84 (New York Times)