Writing has often taken me far beyond my home.

I trekked all over Dixie while I was an editor with Southern Living. Before that, I covered much Midwestern ground for Progressive Farmer magazine. Once and awhile in that 18 year period, I pursued work in California, New Hampshire, or even other countries.

I’ve chatted with Civil War descendants in Brazil, sampled cheese and chocolate in Switzerland, dodged Tour de France cyclists in Paris, floated the Rhine in Germany, played with dolphins in Mexico, and felt the brisk wind blowing at the Irish Cliffs of Mohr.

I’ve written about the famous—Sue Monk Kidd, Naomi Judd, Anne Rice—and the unknown— the horticulturalist responsible for Gaylord Opryland’s lush interior gardens; a triple amputee Vietnam vet who farms; and a washerwoman who gave away her life savings and inspired others to give millions. I recently co-wrote a memoir with Joanne King Herring, the woman Julia Roberts portrayed in the film Charlie Wilson’s War.

I never really had a choice about what work I would pursue.

Fear motivated me to become a writer.

Fear and a teasing big brother who, in a careless moment, informed my pre-school self that I would never, ever learn how to read, much less write.

So when I entered Miss Annie Lee’s first-grade classroom, I eyed her cheerful “A-is-for-apple” cardboard banner and thought of it as a scythe hanging over my head whispering “D-is-for-doom.”

My brother’s taunt proved as effective a learning tool as the “Hooked on Phonics” series. In short order, I could belt out the ABC song backward and forward as if it were a Broadway musical and I a strong contender for the role of Annie.

From then on, the alchemy of linking letters into words, words into sentences, and sentences into stories seemed as necessary and magical as the act of breathing.

Words, glorious words, became a large part of who I am.

I am a storyteller, a wordsmith, a scribe, a word nerd.

A writer.

Years later I knew my transformation was complete when I received a thank you note from Harper Lee thanking ME for my words about her.

I love to tell the story–all stories. I’d love to help you tell yours.

Contact me if you need an author, freelance writer, editor, & speaker.