A new space, a new purpose, a new beginning.

Welcome to my new website!

There is one constant, one theme, one practice that runs a line through all phases of my life.

Before I loved science, or sports or travel. Before I was a wife, a mother, a runner.

Writing.

I have diaries from my 8-year-old self and stacks of journals from high school, college and my 20s. In my mid-thirties I started a blog and began to share my thoughts, an endeavor I found both frightening and fulfilling. I wrote blog posts for myself and a few faithful friends and family members, thought perhaps my children might read them someday. Along the way I realized writing has always been my way of making sense of the world.

I plan to continue writing about the people, things and events in my life that matter to me. But I wanted a new and different place to begin. I wanted a fresh start, a clear demarcation between what I was doing then and what I am doing now. It may not look that different to anyone that followed my old blog, but it feels different to me.

I want to write, all the things, all the time. Each day I find it harder to squelch my desire to write in a bigger and bolder way. It consumes my thoughts, my waking and sleeping moments. I’m like a sponge trying to soak up all I can about the writing life. I have an undergraduate degree in English, but that was so many years ago! And although I gained an immense appreciation for good writing, I learned little about the craft of writing, the tools and tricks of the trade. So now I listen to writing podcasts every single day on my way to work and I have amassed a collection of books on all things writing. I am learning so much, I like to think of it as a DIY MFA, and I’m loving every minute.

I don’t yet know what I want this dream of mine to become, what it might evolve into, but I know I want to create this space for the possibility of what it might be. This website, built with hope and a heavy dose of courage, is for writing new things I can’t yet name.

And there is a real and important reason I’m doing this now, not tomorrow. I’ve wanted to be a writer my entire life, and have shelved this dream for one rational reason after another – for a more practical career in science, until I get tenure, until my children are older – but not anymore. I can’t wait another day.

I’ve watched for the past four years as my Mother has lost memories, her sense of self, the character traits and thoughts that define her as the amazing woman she is. Alzheimer’s Disease is wicked and cruel. I can’t help but wonder if I too will someday be in her position, in danger of losing my self. I am filled with an urgency to write everything down before I forget, before my stories are lost to me. I’m not waiting for tomorrow.

For the past 6 months I’ve been writing a book – a memoir. By writing every day for an hour in the quiet mornings of a still sleeping house, I now have a complete first draft. It is thrilling and terrifying! No where near done, and with only a vague idea of the complicated path forward to putting it out in the world, I do not know what will come of it. But it exists and every moment of creating it has nourished my soul and made me feel invincible. For now, that feeling and the joy of the process is enough.

And in the way I wrote this first draft of a book I’d always dreamed of some day writing, I will explore this new space and be open to whatever it might become. One step at a time. I pledge to show up here with honesty, integrity and a full heart, writing through my story.