Thanks to Professor Ann Angel, the writing track faculty of Mount Mary University, and the talented and inspiring students who experienced this work in its earliest form. While merely scrambling to meet an assignment deadline as I pursued my graduate degree, they encouraged me to spin a thirty-year-old dream (literally) into a short story, then a thesis project, and finally the book you now hold in your hands. Only took an additional eleven years.
Thanks also to early eyeballs along the way, who read partial or “finished” drafts and never failed to send me back to work with new ideas and encouragement. A special shout-out to the well-read dames of the Wauwatosa Enablers, who made Raising the Dad a book club selection when it was only a fat stack of pages and gave me a spark when I really needed it.
Boundless gratitude to Marcia Markland, who responded to an honest-to-God cold query at the precise moment I came to think I had expended all publication options for a book of which I am so proud. Thanks, Marcia, and your able associates Quressa Robinson and Nettie Finn.
To family, friends, colleagues, and total strangers who have said kind things about any of my writing in any of the outlets that have been kind enough to give me a platform over the past thirty-five years: you have no idea how validating your approval has been.
And most of all to Pam, always my champion and my strength. The whole wide world opened up to me the day we met.