We Almost Lost Two Twin Ports Artists This Past Year

Despite efforts to be good defensive drivers, sometimes there's almost nothing one can do because it's so out of the blue and there is so little time to react. Here are brief accounts of two local artists who became victims this past year, plus information about a fund raiser for the latter.

Scott Murphy

Broken Threads...

Last summer, I had scheduled a visit to popular painter and muralist Scott Murphy's studio to do a story in anticipation of his upcoming fall show at Lizzard's here in Duluth. We had spoken the day before and all was arranged, but when I arrived there were no cars in the driveway. No one was home. I did not immediately assume the worst, but after visiting two more times that week with the same reception I began to wonder what had happened. Perhaps he'd been called out of town on an emergency?

After three weeks of periodically stopping or driving by his home, I saw a car in the driveway. I stopped, knocked and was invited in... by his daughter, Claire, whereupon I learned that on that very day when Scott and his wife Colleen were heading home for our meeting, a reckless driver had careened into the Murphy's lane on Highway 2. All the bones in Scott's legs were broken and his wife had serious but less life threatening injuries. It was a crazy thing to happen, but Scott has been a battler and a survivor. His show with UMD Professor Robin Murphy (no relation) was postponed.

Trissa Wilson  (a.k.a. Eris Vafias)

Last spring a car going 60 mph ran a red light and slammed into Trissa's car. In the accident she experience a traumatic brain injury (TBI) that resulted in short-term memory loss, sensitivity to light, visual impairment, as well as cognitive deficits in the areas of processing speed, memory retrieval, attention and concentration. Like many with these kinds of accidents she has PTSD with heightened anxiety and depression. Trissa has gone through speech therapy and occupational therapy. She continues to be in physical therapy and to see other assorted medical providers. It has been 9 months since the incident and she's still waiting for the okay from doctors so she can to go back to work.

A single mother of two growing daughters, she is best known for the Artist Kamikaze events that she has produced over the years as well as other arts related events including the Limbo Gallery that she curates and directs.

Fund Raiser for Trissa / Eris

According to Lydia Walker, whom I was partnered with in my first Artist Kamikaze event, Trissa’s medical bills are piling up and so are the bills for her to just meet the basic needs of her and her girls. She is fighting to not lose their home and despite everything, she has increased her volunteer work in our community, while asking for little from others. She has continued to host free events for local artists to share their work with the community through events like the Artist Kamikaze. The proceeds from these events go all back into the artists’ community and future free events. Trissa sees no profit and she doesn’t care. Trissa just wants to give back to her community and promote the growth of the local arts.

Saturday January 20th 5pm-10pm at the Elks Lodge
1503 Belknap St, Superior, WI 54880
Tickets: $10 each available at the door

Interested in donating:
cash - https://www.gofundme.com/trissas-fund
food/beverage, Musical talent, items for auction - contact fundraisertrissa@gmail.com
For more information follow the event page on Facebook

Update on Scott Murphy

Yesterday I reached out to Scott and gained a new appreciation for the meaning of the word resilience. If I'd not known all he'd been through I'd never have believed, based on his cheerfulness, that he'd been through anything serious at all. As he shared the details, however, we're fortunate he is with us at all.

"It's amazing how much energy it takes to paint," Scott said, lamenting because of how much energy is expended by rehab.

Then we talked about the accident.

"The guy was going between 72 and 90 when he hit us," he said. It happened so fast, and had Scott not veered both he and Colleen would undoubtedly have been killed. The speeding car hit the corner of the Murphy's car  and spun it. Scott was trapped in the car, but Colleen despite a cracked sternum, broken wrist and other injuries, climbed over the seat and managed to escape through the back door. She went out, picked up Scott's glasses off the highway and began directing traffic.

An Emergency Medical Technician just happened to be near and immediately attended to Scott, keeping him conscious and hopeful while waiting for the "jaws of death" to extract the car from around his broken body.  "I was lucky my back wasn't broken or my head damaged, lucky not to have had permanent paralysis," he said. While trapped in the car he had no idea, though, how smashed up he was. He's had four surgeries and a lot of rehab since the accident last summer.

On the positive side of the ledger,  "I had some great hallucinations," Scott said. "I went to Russia, went to the mountains. When you can fly you can go anywhere you want. The hallucinations were a gift."

He also shared how special it was for his daughter to be able to return home and be there for he and his wife. "Claire was such a big help. Colleen and I couldn't do basic functions, like mowing etc. The fact that she took three months off her life to help was wonderful. By her nature she's a healing influence."

For now, the Murphy and Murphy show at Lizzard's is slated for this coming fall. 

Accidents

Man: Did Hemingway ever talk to you?
God: Everybody talks to me… sooner or later.

Circa 1975 I was a security guard at Research-Cottrell working the night shifts at their headquarters in Bedminster, New Jersey. On a beautiful blue sky summer day I'd just gotten off the graveyard shift after celebrating the dawn. At that time I was auditing a class at Princeton Seminary which has one of the most extensive libraries in the world, so I would take out stacks of theology books and study them at place which must have been a Revolutionary War era mansion it seems. My first day, when I was transferred to this building from the manufacturing plant where I had been on guard duty, my heart leapt up at the new place and the verse came to mind, "My Father's house has many mansions."

Another favorite verse at that time was from Psalm 130, "My soul waits for Thee, more than the watchman for the morning." I enjoyed those nights, often singing, reading, praying and drinking a lot of coffee.

So I'd gotten off work this one morning, filled with emotional exuberance, singing worship songs and driving down Highway 202-206, not paying attention as much as I should have evidently because when I came round the bend in the road, the traffic there was stopped in its tracks. Bam!

I'd managed to slow the car but not in time. The front end crunched the rear of the poor fellow in front of me. Traffic was stopped so I got uot, even though we were in the fast lane. In checking the damage I noticed that the nose of my Pontiac had hit directly into the license plate in the center below the truck. These were the days when you filled your gas tank in the rear, the cap hidden by that plate.

As I walked to the driver's door, the windows were down. Four hippies were in the car looking at a man with short hair in a police uniform. A couple were talking fast. I reassured them that I was not a cop, but suggested we should call because there was some damage and it was my fault. "No, man, don't call the cops," they said.

I tried to explain that the gas tank end was bent and they would not be able to refill it. They assured me this was not a problem. No one had cell phones in those days, so when we parted company, it was as if it never happened and I often wonder how they fixed that bent gas tank end. The Pontiac did not even have a dent.

The collision reminded me of another incident in a rear-ended car a few years earlier. I was at Ohio U, my junior year, hanging out with Fred and some other acid heads. Fred was a poet from Chicago who wore a leather jacket that said U R 2 on the back. A girl at the apartments had her father's car for the weekend so we all decided to ride into town. We were very stoned. The apartments sat up on a hill and we had to go down the hill to get onto highway 50 into town. At the bottom of the hill we were stopped at a stop sign when suddenly, bam. We all looked at each other. "I think someone just hit us," one of us said. It was night.

We all got out and saw a car, headlights on bouncing sheen off the back of our Lincoln. A skinny black guy in a striped shirt was moving in a hyperanimated way, his head jerking up and down, checking out the scene, assessing the damage. We, too, were assessing the damage.

"Did you just hit us?" the girl said.

"Hey, man, I'm sorry. Don't call the cops."

"I don't think it's very serious," I said after trying to find the dent.

The others looked hard at the back of the car. It was very difficult to tell what the back of the car normally looked like, but at the time it seemed pretty normal.

"Please don't call the cops, please please please," the man pleaded.

We continued to study the back of the car as other cars drove by. The pleading went on and on and on. It was probably thirty second but seemed like four days. Eventually, we decided there was no damage to the car and the black kid immediately leapt into his own, backed up and then sped off.

I really never knew that girl whose car we were in, but I did hear later from Fred that her dad was more than a little peeved to discover she'd somehow gotten a dent in the rear of his car.

Other accidents are coming to mind, but that's enough for today. I think there are some lessons here.