With any luck, as we get older, and more contemplative, we get wiser.  Opinions are tempered with the knowledge that almost all issues are more complex than a sound-bite; and the sides of any story are as multi-faceted as a diamond.

Best advice from my mother:  You owe no one an explanation for who you are or what you do with your life.  Live it.  It is yours and only yours.  You will make mistakes, have regrets, need to apologize.  Everyone does.  None of that takes away from the gloriousness that is you.

I am a: Wife, Mom, G-mom, Writer/Reader, Regulatory Affairs Professional Quality Assurance Expert, Microbiologist/Chemist, Pest Control Specialist, Trained Tongue, Seamstress, Organizer, Knitter, TV Watcher, Cook, Bicycle enthusiast, swimmer, Yoga practicer, Environmentalist, Techno-geek, Progressive Catholic, Believer in love, and much, much, more…

I gave up nearly 30 years of corporate leadership to find my way as a writer.  Still, my soul is infused with health, science and quality principles, so you will see that side of me peaking through in all that  I write.

Here are some places you will find my writing:

• My memoir at Once A Little Girl
• Syndicated feature articles on BlogHer.com (2011 Voice of the Year Honoree)
• Syndicated feature article on WherearewegoingChicago.com
• Syndicated feature article on About.com
• Published memoir, “Ride Like the Wind,” article PKA Advocate
• Published feature articles in The TribLocal (a section of The Chicago Tribune)
• Published short story, “The Fable of Little Surrti” in Mosaic (an anthology)
• Published poetry “Desert Wisdom”  in A Book of Reflections

Work in progress:  A Land of Milk and Honey

My first publication was at the age of six, in The Flint Journal.  I love creating stories.  I am writing a novel about a boy growing up in the Great Depression.  Why? you might ask.  Well, the book is loosely based on my father’s life.  He has five brothers and one sister.  They lived in a tiny one room house, all eight of them , until it burned to the ground in 1933.  About the only thing they managed to save was the sewing machine – an unwelcome Christmas present Ellis gave to Ida that year.  Can you imagine saving the one thing that you really didn’t want, and nothing else?  The Crandells were one of the few families that had homeowners insurance, so there was nothing to worry about.  Ellis put the money in the Savings and Loan and began dickering for the piece of property on Potter Road.  Within the week, the bank closed.  Belly up.  The money was gone.  Ellis and Ida found places for the kids to stay among the neighbors, and began the three year process of bringing the family back together again.

You might think if anyone had a reason to be bitter, Ellis and Ida did.  You might think if anyone had childhood damage from a broken home, it would be those Crandell kids.  Yet those six boys and their sister are the most good-humored, positive, open people I’ve ever known.  I never met Ellis, I’m told he got my mother to cultivate a pig weed all summer long, convincing her it was a tomato.  Ida was a gentle, quiet soul with a heart full of love, who never quite got over the loss Ellis.
Pop is a great story-teller.  Some of what he tells is true, some is not.  So first off, the book has got to be fiction, because it’s impossible for me to be sure what stories he tells are really true.   I once took a stone to school and told the teacher and the whole class we found a petrified potato in our garden – I believed my father when he told me that’s what I held in my hand.  Maybe Pop thought I would know he was pulling my leg; maybe he was tired of his budding scientist -daughter’s unrelenting questions; at any rate, I’m pretty sure now that Pop knew that rock was not a petrified potato, but that’s how convincing he can be.   To this day, I’m only pretty sure, not positive that he was pulling my leg.  The second reason the story must be fiction is because I am honoring his wishes, to protect the guilty.  He doesn’t want anyone to know whether the “bad” parts are real or I made them up.  I suggest you believe it all because that’s what will make his faded blue eyes twinkle and the corners of his mouth twitch.