I fell in love with words when I was very young, listening to my mother sing us ballads. By the time I was ten we were a clan of nine, and I generally escaped into my favorite apple tree to write.
I had the luck of a great education at the “U of M” in Minneapolis, graduating in French and journalism, which helped launch me as a journalist into a year-long internship to travel East and West Europe and write about it, a mind-bending experience.
That led to an editorship in New York, finding my voice and my first agent, and the first publication of one of my stories in Ms. I lived on the upper West Side in a wise communal household of women, and when one couldn’t finish a semester of teaching, I took over for her at a university upstate and discovered my profession.
I moved to Boulder to write my first book and to complete an M.A. in creative writing at the University of Colorado. And thereon stayed in the magnificent West, to teach and live, eventually, with my husband and our two children.
I am grateful for twenty-one literary awards that have allowed me to write.
Some favorite teaching and community work:
- Syndication editor, Fairchild Publications; features editor, Réalités, 1977-1982
- Script analyst for Warner’s, Walt Disney & HBO, NYC, 1979-1984
- Writer-in-residence, K-12 schools, Colorado, Wyoming, Montana & Oregon, 1987-1999
- Professorships at the University of Wyoming, Portland State University, Lewis & Clark College, Linfield College, Pace University & Pacific University, Colorado Mesa University, 1988-present.
- Director, Washington State University writing program, Vancouver, 1994-1997
- Founder & Executive Director, Western Colorado Writers’ Forum, a nonprofit center for Western Slope writers with many community and student activities, 2010-2014. Currently, board advisor.
- Owner, Two Rivers Editorial, 1990-present. Contract writer & editor of books for writers, businesses, government and publishers.
