I write short-form memoir and long-form narrative nonfiction. I dig deep to explore choices made, lessons lived and learned. My elixir is the pursuit of wonder that turns a half empty glass into a vibrant, heady, filled-to-the-brim life experience.
I am a work in progress, even in retirement. I’ve spent countless hours examining and re-examining my cellular makeup. I’ve assessed and analysed, challenged and capitulated, yearned and settled, and mostly, moved on. When stuck, I find ways to get going. When I’m racing too fast to hear my own thoughts, I plunk myself down and dig in. And when I am devoid of hope and joy and synchronicity, I realize I am down a tank of wonder. Ordinary, everyday wonder.
Where I live
I live in Gibsons on BC’s Sunshine Coast, a place where EB White’s quotation about wonder is spelled out in childish block letters on the outside of the Arts Building. Where the mountains propel themselves straight out of the ocean’s clutches to heights that challenge rock climbers to summit, and the rest of us to gasp.
What I’ve learned
I have learned voraciously since I finished a BA in the early ‘70’s. Lessons about loving, leaving, letting go in the ‘80’s. Clambering up the career ladder, against the odds in the ‘90s, before summiting as a VP at the glass ceiling.
Back to school for an MBA in 1999, so I’d have a shiny new credential to peddle when I tried to shop myself around at 50. Since then, I’ve a Certificate in Creative Writing, and a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Creative Writing at 66.
What I’ve Written
“A Fuller Life,” chronicles the journey of Michelle Fuller who was diagnosed in 1999, at age thirty, with a rare cancer only a specialist at Sloan Memorial in New York could identify. Twenty years later, Michelle’s resilience, fueled by meaning and purpose, is a clarion call for the rest of us to stop whining, and embrace possibility. I wrote her story to find out how she does it.
What’s Next
I am immersed in writing about the cornerstone of my sanity, my serenity, my life: a wood cabin built in the early twentieth century. Perched on a point in Howe Sound, redolent with the smell of cedar and salt water, lashed by waves and lapped by wavelets, the cabin’s resilience over more than a hundred years fills my tank with wonder. A series of linked short memoirs details the lessons I’ve learned and lived thanks to this wondrous haven.
