About Me

I was five months pregnant with my first child, a girl, when my father died of metastasized colon cancer on Aug. 26, 2004. In December of that year, I gave birth to a baby who would become known as The Poo.

In the 12 months that followed these two life-altering events, my whole world changed.

Becoming a mother—especially while I was mourning such a significant loss—was terrifying, exhilarating and exhausting. Then, just months before my daughter’s first birthday, we bought a house we would end up selling nine months later to move 700 miles to the west, in Chambana, Illinois.

In March 2006, I began blogging in an effort to work through my grief and my fears about being a parent. It seemed natural for me, a former journalist and life-long diarist, to chronicle my life in words. Little did I know that hitting the “publish” button would not only revive my freelance writing career, but also serve as a lifeline when we planted temporary roots in the prairie of the Great Middle West so my husband could enroll as a full-time doctoral candidate at a Huge Midwestern University.

There are still times when I long for the hills, the green trees and the Great Lake of our hometown, but I’m getting used to life at a different pace, one ear of corn at a time. In August 2008 I gave birth to my son, The Babyman. Because he is a native Chambanan, I’ll always have a piece of Illinois with me—no matter where I end up.

This is the story of my life, as I see it.