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So, who am I, anyway?
In this country, we usually answer that question by saying what we do, which is not the same as who we are. Hopefully, though, who we are and what we do are connected in some way. So, besides being a writer, I’m a Reiki Master (in case you’re wondering, Reiki is pronounced “ray-key” with the accent on the first syllable), and I was ordained several years ago as an interfaith minister.
I live with various cats (all of whom are indoor critters now) who showed up in my life at just the right times. They’ve taught me a lot about the important things in life—self-esteem, boundary setting (when to hiss and when to walk away), and naps (on something soft in the summer shade or the winter sun).
I’m not much a joiner, so there’s no sense in my listing the organizations I’ve been a part of over the years since I’ve transitioned out of them all. I sing alto. I laugh a lot, and I write for the sheer joy of it. When I was in seventh grade at East Junior High School in Colorado Springs, I had a wonderful English teacher named Miss Helen Johnson. She taught me to love Shakespeare, to write from my soul center, to appreciate classical music, and not to make excuses for myself when I blew that test (for which I had not studied). She listened with an understanding heart. I kept in touch with her by snail-mail for the rest of her life, and always knew that she was one of those amazing women who paved the way for me.
Since I was an Air Force brat, I don’t have a hometown, unlike Biscuit McKee. I attended four different schools ninth to twelfth grades. Went to Illinois Wesleyan University for two years (and consider it my true alma mater, even though I didn’t graduate from there). Took a very long sabbatical. Got married. Seven years later, had a couple of kids. Then I went back to school part-time for seven years, and graduated from Trinity College in Burlington, Vermont. Trinity, by the way, closed its doors several years ago – it wasn’t my fault! My resumé is a catalog of small jobs, since I chose for a long time to be a stay-at-home mom. I sold various stuff (and will never again try anything multi-level as long as I live, so don’t even ask), worked in a women’s shelter, edited a couple of newsletters, taught color analysis, was a substitute teacher in Vermont. Finally, after 25 years of marriage, I realized that I wasn’t very good at being a wife. I wrote a series of songs that I now call Happily Single: a Sing-Along for Women Who Are Divorced. At the time I simply called them my sanity songs. I ended up using them as the basis for my Master’s Thesis. Someday I may even record them or find someone to record them for me.
Since 1993, I’ve lived in Georgia, northeast of Atlanta, where my house is surrounded by a bird and butterfly sanctuary that I created from essentially bare ground (three tall pines and a sick azalea), in large part because I read King Solomon’s Ring by Conrad Lorenz when I was a young girl. I was fascinated by the idea of working with nature instead of against it. Since then another book that has become a beacon for me is Noah’s Garden by Sara Stein. I use no pesticides in my yard and no fertilizers other than compost. Yes, like Biscuit McKee, I built my own three-bin compost pile.
My idea of redecorating has always been to get another bookshelf (one the cats can sit on top of).
Why is this such a long About the Author blurb? I always want to know more about my favorite authors than those little bitty descriptions, and I figured you might want that, too.