Adventure Is Out There!

…A Path of Fire and Resilience…

Last month I embarked on two new adventures amid 2020’s steadily topsy-turvy episodes.  For those of you who know me personally, you know how the 2020 CZU Lightning Complex fires that raged through the Santa Cruz Mountains affected me directly.  I evacuated in August with the terrible feeling that I would return home to an entire town of ashes.  After two months of displacement, my beautiful mountain home is still standing, though the devastation throughout the upper valley is heartbreaking.  Look for the creative piece of my personal experience coming out (hopefully) next month.

The fire struck our community fiercely, but mountain members emerged from all corners of the redwood forest to help each other in creative ways.  I saw a Facebook post reaching out to the community members of Boulder Creek and welcoming them to share their stories in response to the fire.  These stories would eventually be compiled into a book and published; all the proceeds would go to the BC Fire Department.  Of course, being a writer, I reached out to the lead administrator.  We quickly bonded, and the lead invited me on the project to assist with its construction and development.  I am now the project co-administrator!

I feel deeply honored to help my community in a way that expresses my character and reveals all of the unique voices entangled within our mountains.  Our mission is to:

Build (and rebuild) community, promote healing, and raise funds for the heroic Boulder Creek Fire Department.  We seek to capture the truth of the devastation caused by the CZU fire while underscoring the resilience of our community.  Through gathering personal stories and images from members of the Boulder Creek community and compiling these experiences into a single book for publication, we will create a collective community voice.

Check out the Facebook page for more information!  You can also contact me directly if you live in Boulder Creek and you would like your voice heard.

…A Path of Linguistic Divinity…

When I was a young girl, Language courted me with fairytales and songs.  Over time, I fell in love with its endless lexicon, grammatical structure, and riveting etymology.  I felt the romance, humor, and darkness in its stories and poetry.  I allowed Language to intertwine our passions, histories, and maturations.  Using words to form a marriage between our souls, we became one.

Language and its functionality have always been a passion of mine.  My detail-oriented personality made me susceptible to falling in love with the nuts and bolts of language’s structure.  A couple of years ago, I realized I could funnel this passion of mine into a rewarding career as a Book Editor.  Though I still strive to be an author, now I will carve myself a new path into the world of language.

Last September, I took my first steps into the world of editing.  I began attending the Professional Sequence in Editing program at UC Berkeley Extension.  Not only will I refine old skills and develop new ones, but I will be able to understand exactly why a sentence “sounds/looks better.”  I will be able to answer grammatical questions with definitive answers.  Most importantly, these skills will better my own writing and provide a professional service that other writers deserve.  As Stephen King once said, “to write is human, to edit is divine.”  I can only hope that one day I will achieve such linguistic excellence.