Knowing My Place

I've never been a person who knows their "place." It's always gone against my grain to have someone tell me where I belong--held to someone else's standards. I set the standards in my life. I control what I do and to what level I do it.

Tell me I can't do something and I will do it just to prove you wrong. Maybe this comes from being the youngest of five kids and always being told I couldn't do something because I was too small or too young. Man, I got so tired of hearing that from my siblings.

I was working at the newspaper and when an opportunity to write opened up and I took it. I dealt with a surprising amount of negativity from the newsroom reporters. I was a mere news clerk. Didn't I know my "place" was to answer their phones and not have the audacity to think I could do something their college educated behinds did every day?

But I did it. I had my little niche in special sections and I wrote my fingers off. I always took pride in whatever I did and gave it 100 percent. I never aimed for the newsroom. It takes a certain type of personality to work in a newsroom and I just didn't have the shark mentality. I covered the automotive field. I was told women don't cover cars--what do they know about them? Well, I knew a few things. And I wrote about them for 13 years. For goodness' sake, I'm a writer, not a flipping mechanic. I had fun doing it--driving cars and oh, yeah, winning county, state, national and international writing awards while doing it. I’m not perfect, but I apply heart and soul to everything I do.

When it comes to my personal life, I wasn't going to let anyone tell me what I should or shouldn't do. Instead of waiting for my husband to ask me to marry him, I asked him to marry me. Before he knew it, I had him to Las Vegas and officially made him mine. Why did I have to know my "place" and let him ask me? I knew what I wanted and I went after it.

Places, places, places---I don't give a fig about titles. You want me to respect you? Don't go flaunting a title at me. Show me how hard you work, and then I will respect you. Show me how committed you are to doing the best job possible no matter what it is you do, and I will respect you. But don't expect me to know my "place" and respect you just because you have a flipping title. It doesn't mean diddly squat in my world.

I can and will do whatever I set my mind to--no matter what it is. I know my "place" is wherever I put it.

Aliens Among Us

I was in junior high when I wrote my first play. I'm not sure why my writing career started with a play instead of a short story, but a play it was. I know I was heavily influenced when I read Erich von Däniken's "Chariot of the Gods?" My play was about alien astronauts who land on earth and what they find when they get here. Not only did I write the play, but I directed it as it was performed in front of my classmates. It wasn't performed on stage, but in front of the classroom. We made props and everything. So began my writing career. lol

I've always been a behind-the-scenes kind of person. I've never sought out the limelight. That's why I like writing. I can create my own worlds, my own characters and live vicariously through them. I'm shy. I always have been. I can socialize with the best of them, but with my hearing disability it's always made me uncomfortable to be in front of a group of people. The more people there are, the harder it is to hear properly--hearing aids or not.

But with writing, I can always be in control. I can "hear" everything that's going on and I won't make a fool of myself. Normal hearing people have no clue how awkward it is to not understand what's going on around you. I can't count the many times I've misunderstood conversations and embarrassed myself. I swear I'm going to get a bumper sticker for my Jeep, "I'm not stupid, I just can't hear you right."

Writing allows me the chance to say what I want, how I want and I like that a lot. It's good therapy for me to work through frustrations with writing. I had one short I did where I worked through some aggressions I had--I call it my "Jean-Claude Van Damme" moment. It felt good to kick someone's butt even if I don't do it in real life.

There have been times when I have felt like an alien on this planet. Not fitting in the hearing world and not fitting in the deaf world. I've always been on the outside looking in.

I've been working on a book for the longest time. My protagonist is a hard-of-hearing lady who deals with a mystery. What are the odds? lol They say to write what you know. Well, I know what's it's like to face hearing challenges. So that's what I'm writing. One day, I might actually finish it. I work on it, and then set it aside. I tinker with it and push it away.

It's a challenge. But I think I will stick with it. Unless an ancient alien arrives in my backyard and entices me to visit his planet. Then all bets are off.

When I Grow Up

By junior high, I knew what I wanted to be when I grew up--a librarian. Go ahead, laugh your butt off. It's true. I fell in love with reading when my parents bought me a handful of hardbound Nancy Drew mysteries. It was love at first paragraph. The deal was closed in the 5th grade when I won a contest in Mrs. White's class and the reward was my own copy of “The Prince and the Pauper.”



I knew then, I needed books—lots and lots of books. Although my real life was dull and boring, books could transport me to other lands, other times, and if I wanted help me be a different person. Every time I opened a cover of a book an adventure awaited. I have literally read thousands and thousands of books, plays and magazines. I think it would be fair to say I'm a bookaholic.

From 7th grade forward I worked in the school library. I knew the Dewey Decimal System backwards and forwards. I was an assistant to every librarian up through my senior year of high school. I even took a library class in college. I was stymied in my attempt to become a librarian due to a couple of reasons--I paid my own way through college (I had no help from anyone) and the University of Nevada, Reno didn't offer a degree an ALA–accredited master’s degree in library and information science. The closest schools that had that program were either Berkeley or UCLA. I couldn't afford either one. It was a bitter pill to swallow.

I wound up moving to California with my parents right after my first semester in college. Yeah, I was closer to UCLA, but boo, I still didn't have enough money. Then a couple of months later I met Jerry and wham bam thank you ma'am, we were married. Before I knew it, we had a family and my college dreams were put aside.

But books still held their allure for me. I never stopped reading. Heck, I even took a book to Vegas when Jerry and I got married. lol

As I raised my son, then my second son came around, I always took them to the Arvin library. It was a small place, but I loved it. I enjoyed being around the books so much, I donated my time to help them shelf books. After doing that for six months, they hired me on. I was thrilled. Even though I was a temporary library clerk I was in seventh heaven. I was around all those wonderful books, helping people, and they paid me for it!

That was such a great summer. I was seriously thinking about applying for a job at the central library in town, but was discouraged by coworkers on how political it was there.

By a strange twist of fate I wound up working at the daily newspaper in Bakersfield. I started as a news clerk (a glorified typist/phone gal) and again opportunity fell in my lap and I became a writer. I had the job before I had the degree.

More than one "real" reporter asked me how I got the job. To my face, mind you. How can I be writing if I hadn't gone to college? I was able to write because I was a professional reader. I wasn't just a casual reader. I can honestly say I have probably read more books than most all of the writers combined from that newsroom. Okay, that might sound a bit arrogant. But in high school, I read seven books and two plays per week. I'm a serious "reader."

I think the key was when I worked at the newspaper that I kept myself humble and I was always learning. I had some incredibly talented teachers--some of them even reporters from the newspaper where I worked. I continued my college career, working full time and raising my sons. It was hard, and without Jerry it would have been impossible. But I did it.

My love of reading carried me to places in my real life I never even knew possible. When we bought our house in Texas, I was able to finally purchase what I always wanted--beautiful custom-made oak bookcases.



I finally had a place to display my beloved friends. That and I have a library in my house. I might not be a professional librarian, but I play one at home. lol