Welcome to my website, an expression of my inner world. Creating with words and pictures are equally important to my emotional and spiritual health. I also teach and give lectures on a variety of subjects. I love to cook (especially for others), and to sew and embroider. I listen to blues daily, read constantly, am curious about the world and its occupants, but am also a bit of a recluse, staying close to my drawing board, writing area and kitchen. My personality is combination of the worldly and the unworldly, as is reflected in all my creations.
I was born and grew up in Berkeley, California. Art, writing and music have been important to me my entire life. One of the most wonderful things about Berkeley was the rich exposure to a variety of music. Pete Seeger, Jean Ritchie and Mance Lipscomb gave children’s concerts. There were annual jazz festivals at the university where I heard greats such as Miles Davis, Thelonius Monk and Carmen McRae, and folk festivals and concerts featuring Joan Baez and Bob Dylan, along with more traditional folk musicians. Mostly I got hooked on the blues. By the ripe old age of age of fifteen I was hanging out in San Francisco at the Fillmore and Avalon ballrooms and at free rock concerts in Golden Gate and Provo Parks. I attended the Monterey Pop Festival the week after my sixteenth birthday. I listened to the underground FM radio stations constantly; the music of the time expressed my feelings about what was going on around and inside me.
A lot was going on in the Sixties. I was front and center at virtually every major happening, demonstration and protest in the San Francisco Bay Area. I inhaled my share of tear gas at Vietnam protests and the People’s Park demonstrations.
A little too much was going on for peace of mind. In 1970 I learned Transcendental Meditation, and have been practicing it regularly ever since. I became a teacher in 1973, and have taught in the U.S., the Philippines and Taiwan. I studied with and worked on the staff of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the founder of the TM organization, in Europe and in India.
I went to college and art school, worked as a chef in France and Switzerland, roamed around South India going to temples and holy places, ran a health spa in Missouri, and have worn a dozen other hats and even made a few. Some of my richest experiences have been sitting at home at the drawing board or writing.
I try to live by the wise sage Satchel Paige’s advice to “Work like you don’t need the money, love like you’ve never been hurt, dance like nobody’s watching.” I have done all three, rather foolishly at times, but with all my heart.