I am an author – artist with an unconventional life that I sometimes wish were fiction. My manuscript, “Benign Presence: the Secrets and Salvos of a Brokeback Marriage” reads like a novel. Although this is my first book, I’ve been a magazine publisher, columnist, newsletter editor and all-around business writer. Books written by family and friends have a special spot in my library. My bookshelves, if stretched end-to-end, would be as long as a third of a football field. And that doesn’t include the e-books on my Kindle!

Most of my career has been spent as a senior executive in the not-for-profit sector where I advocated for gender equity, health promotion and access to medical care. I am cause-oriented and recently marched in front of Saint Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City in support of the Nun’s Justice Project. When the occasion warrants, I stand up for the ordination of women priests and the restoration of married persons to the priesthood. I prefer humble piety to self-serving pomposity and don’t believe that medieval mediocrity is an inspired model for modern spirituality.

Fifty years after winning a prize, I discovered that the tubes of watercolor paint I’d been saving had all dried up, so I decided to get some fresh supplies and give art another try. My work has recently been exhibited at the annual Naked in New Hope show at the Sidetracks Art Gallery in Pennsylvania.

I love watching my alma mater play basketball, arranging fresh flowers, reading cookbooks while I’m eating lunch, drinking chardonnay with friends, and reading in front of a fireplace. You’d probably be less likely to find me working out at the Y, than seeing me at an event at the library, or enjoying a glass of iced tea at an outdoor table at a local eatery.

 Cheers!