Look and Listen

Biography

When I was 4 1/2 years old, I remember being sent to my room for a nap, but instead of resting, I practiced printing alphabet letters - all over my newly papered bedroom wall. What I most recall about that day was having to stand behind the dinette door, perched right next to my mother's old Singer Sewing Machine, until I apologized for my misbehavior. I couldn't understand why I was being punished for all my hard work, so I stood there for what seemed like hours, rather than offer up an apology. Fortunately this inauspicious beginning didn't dampen my enthusiasm for writing! I graduated from Barnard College of Columbia University, with a major in Sociological Research and married Ken, a Columbia student about 8 days later. We set off for New Haven, where Ken began his studies as a law student. I needed to put aside my author's dreams and find a way to support my student husband and myself. The state college nearest our apartment was offering an Intensive Teacher Training program so I enrolled and six weeks later had received provisional certification as an elementary school teacher. I signed a contract, began teaching in Cheshire Conn., and continued to take evening and summer courses throughout the next three years until I earned a Master's Degree - just in the knick of time. I went into labor while typing the bibliography for my Master's thesis, and begged Ken to let me finish before setting off for the hospital! After raising our family, I enrolled at Hofstra University on Long Island to work on a second Master's degree - this time with a concentration in Reading and Special Education. I taught for 21 more years and loved every moment of it. (Well, almost every moment - nothing is perfect!) Before I retired, I told Ken, "I know what I want to do with the rest of my life. I want to write." He more or less humored me, taking the attitude, "If you're happy, I'm happy." I worked as co-editor of a Long Island web-zine for the next three years, where I initiated a column I named, "Ordinary People - Extraordinary Lives." While interviewing such a fascinating array of people in order to write their special stories, I discovered my passion for investigative journalism.

Inspiration

I was the first prizewinner of the senior essay contest at my high school. But it wasn't so much the award that thrilled me as my English teacher's inscription written inside the front cover of the leather bound edition of Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet presented to me that day. "You are a talented and perceptive writer. You should consider pursuing a career that utilizes your special skills." Fast forward to college. I didn't much love Economics, a required course with assigned readings that I frequently put aside in preference to my favorites: English, French and Sociology. I would cram furiously the night before each Economic test - memorizing just enough to squeak by. I think my professor thought me somewhat of a dimwit, expecting little from me and getting little in return. Mid way though the course, my Economics professor assigned a term paper that intrigued me - the first time I was motivated to do any real work for this class. I dug in and did my thing. Several weeks later, before returning our papers, he announced that he had several surprises while grading these papers. “Some students whom I expected to do well, disappointed me, while others, for whom I held low expectations, did extraordinarily well,” he explained. I received an A along with an invitation to meet him in his office after class. His words are still indelibly imprinted in my memory. "This is your special talent. I hope you will pursue a career in writing. It would be a shame for you to waste your abilities.” It took quite a while for the words of these two teachers to inspire me enough to actively pursue writing as a career, but clearly their words had a powerful impact. My book, Sex, Lies and Cosmetic Surgery, began as a work combining memoir and research, but the experience of interviewing subjects for my Web-zine column further encouraged me to add aspects of journalism to my manuscript. Before I had completed this ambitious undertaking, I had interviewed over 100 women and blended in their very candid stories to deliver a work that has been described as “filled with humor and keen insight.”