Living as an Author and a Photographer

At least forty years ago I became fascinated with drawing my life timeline. I don’t know how many I’ve drawn through the years, but probably at least twenty or so. This all started in the 60’s with a group of suburban women working in the Fifth City Community on Chicago’s west side.

I do know that I never projected becoming an author. I do know that several of the early timelines had me dead and gone several years ago. But lo and behold – after I retired from TeamTech Inc. in 2001, I am still here and I discovered I am an author. 

The first book I wrote, The Facilitative Way: Leadership That Makes the Difference has all been sold. Self-published so I could have all the say in what it said…and looked like. 2,000 copies are out there somewhere.

Written to share the facilitation methods that we used in our work with clients, I hope those 2,000 copies are producing great facilitative leadership wherever they are being used.

My second book, A Pioneer Love Story: The Letters of Minnie Hobart is reported to be a “good read.” Besides being the story of my grandmother’s life, it is a personalized history of the Texas Panhandle. This book has been such fun because of the people I have met and talked with who have connections with that part of the country. It is full of photographs and also self-published. I still have copies for sell plus it is available at Amazon.com and several museums in Texas and Vermont.

Cooper’s Hawks Go To School is my third book.  A non-fiction book, this is intended for readers ages 9-12. Actually, I think any age will enjoy this true story of the unusual treat I had of watching (and photographing) three young Cooper’s Hawks learning how to be hawks from their mother.

I’m still hunting for an agent and/or a publisher for this story. Schools, libraries, and wildlife area gift shops are targets for receiving this book when it is published.

A fourth book: Untitled: My friend, Kaze Gadway, and I are working on a book of short stories of our lives. We are looking at the times that the Sacred has entered our life and given us the freedom to say yes to what is.

We experience God's presence, the Holy, the Sacred… when we see beyond and through the mundane events in our lives.  We call it a God event when a situation is transformed from bad to good, ugly to beautiful.

It is not easy to predict where life will take us…but it is a helpful exercise when we are younger. Now the task is…live the life we have.