I was never meant to be an author. I can’t spell. Sometime even Spellcheck gives up on me. But I do love language. I love that scribbled letters on a page can make readers laugh, cry, gasp, or levitate with joy.
I grew up in a meat-and-potatoes world, with a side salad of mostly iceberg lettuce and a whisper of ranch dressing. I worked hard for good grades and had my sights set on law school. Then the law library burned down. (True story. I didn’t do it.) Suddenly, I had a year to kill. So, I enrolled in a fine arts program “just for fun.” You know, like most people do while waiting for fire damage to be repaired.
Reader, I never went back. I finished the fine arts degree. Then I got a master’s. Now I write full time, and my sole legal battles are held in check by the grammar police.
These days, I talk to a lot of parents. Many of them secretly long for a little more creativity in their lives. There’s the dentist who paints on weekends, the teacher who escapes to a poetry retreat every summer, and the engineer who sculpts masterpieces out of Scotch tape. I see you, Office Supplies Sculptor. You are not alone.
So, I write for their kids—kids who deal with ordinary struggles but tackle them in delightfully imaginative ways. My characters are resilient. They take the scenic route through life, sometimes ignoring the Wrong Way sign. They’re stubbornly hopeful. They cope by building skyscraper tree forts; designing T-shirts with slogans like There are three kinds of people: those who are good at math and those who aren’t; and charting the night sky in case Earth doesn’t work out.
They live with something I call “cheerful despair.” That’s when you know life is hard, full of setbacks and heartbreaks—but you still manage to find joy, crack a joke, or dance in your pajamas while the dog makes off with your slipper. Cheerful despair knows life is ridiculous and painful, but it refuses to let that stop the fun.
That’s what I write about. Kids, creativity, and making the best of things—even when the salad is mostly iceberg and the law library is on fire.
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