About the Author

I was born of privilege and raised in a gated community…Wait. Let me try that again.
I was born inside of the guarded fences surrounding Loring AFB in Limestone Maine. My first diaper was stamped 'property of the U.S.A.F.' and for the the next 12 years, that’s who we were. Government property. As any Military Brat will tell you, it’s a very different way of life; Of course at the time, we aren’t aware of it. It’s a life of relocating, changing schools, friends coming and going, and most of all, seeing this country first hand from the back seat of your parent’s station wagon.

We were fortunate to only undergo a few moves. Most of our time was spent in the Northeast with the exception of a stint in Omaha, Nebraska. We finally retired in 1986 from Griffiss AFB in Upstate NY.

It was decided that the place we would officially call ‘home’ would be the small rural town of Westmoreland. I was relieved. Finally a school and friends that would not be changing again. I graduated from Westmoreland Central School in 1992.

Of course our Nomadic lifestyle would only cease briefly before we were back on the road. At least this time, home base would always be in the same location. While we lived in the mid-west, I began taking horseback riding lessons, which of course lead to a show horse and a show career.

In 1989 my parents purchased my first Quarter Horse and we spent the next five years traveling the Quarter Horse Circuit….back on the road; only this time the station wagon was my father’s pickup truck with a trailer in tow.

We traveled to every corner and crevice of New York State along with Toronto, Oklahoma, and two weeks in Fort Worth, Texas for the World Championships.

My life has been a great deal about travel and experience, and for that, I consider myself very lucky. I have lived inside of the privileged, ‘ID required to enter’ world, and I have lived in the sticks. I have lived in a city with a slaughter house downtown, and I have spent a great deal of my time in two car traffic jams behind a John Deer tractor. I feel like my ability to see much of this country and my experiences in all of these different walks of life have truly enriched my life. I think these are the things that help me write. They are memories and experiences I have to trap forever on paper. And it’s usually in that process that I find myself led to a new adventure that I have to share.

As an adult I have remained in this agreeable one horse town of Westmoreland, NY. I reside here today with my husband, our three Boxers and our stray cat, Maybe (maybe we keep her, maybe we don’t…I think she’s a keeper).

Why Do I Write?
It’s recently occurred to me that writing has become an obsession for my mind. But why? Why have I decided to vulnerably try my hand at writing?

I have many answers to that question, and hopefully they will be explained as you tour my website. In a nutshell however, this is how it came about...

As a teenager I was elected to the position of ‘Newsletter Editor’ of our local youth riding club….basically nobody else wanted the job and I wanted to hold an elected office for my college transcripts. I hesitantly took the job, but to my surprise, what I found was that I really enjoyed putting the newsletter together.

I was at every horse show anyway, so I started reporting back on the happenings at each event. My mother and I together would talk to enough people to find out everything interesting, funny, or commendable at the different equine events. I would then write a full article in each month’s edition. For two years we wrote, illustrated, interviewed, printed, folded and mailed out each issue. We were quite a team.

After graduating my youth ranks, writing was not a necessity anymore…so I stopped. In May of 2000 our good friend invited us up for a weekend on the St. Lawrence Seaway. We stopped at a convenience store along the way where I spotted a little pocket sized note book with a horse on the cover. I brought that with me to the river.

As the boys played on the water I climbed down to a rock and sat with the river lapping at my feet….I started to write. In that afternoon by the St. Lawrence I awoke something in me that I had forgotten about. I had let my imagination go dormant. Now it was awake…and full of ideas.

After we returned home, I started writing aimlessly. Bits and pieces of things scattered about; some on paper, some on computer disk, and some are still hibernating in the vault of my mind. Nothing of course, ever being completed.

Common for most struggling authors, their first chosen topic is something that they know….so of course, My Memoirs. Those remain only half written. But in writing them, did lead me to the first book that I have completed for publication. In jotting down my past, I was forced into remembering the three young kids from East Carter Road. Three friends that played make believe for hours in the woods. From that, The Chasers was born.
So here I am now…so many ideas, so many stories….and not a second to write any of it down with any comprehension. But I’m trying. This is the beginning; my very own Once Upon a Time.