Storytelling has always been a part of me. As a storyteller, I have always wanted to share my stories with others. Whether I write about a man who met a Banshee predicting his death on his dark walk home from a pub, or a young woman in the 1850’s with a ruined reputation and few choices, I want others to hear these stories, see them, experience them. And for me, that’s what playwriting does. It is real time, person to person sharing. That’s why I write plays.

I came to the world of serious playwriting late thanks to raising a family and caregiving an elderly parent. But the stories swirled in my head, and sometimes onto paper as songs, poems, and plays. Moving away from Los Angeles enabled me to focus more on my playwriting. I live on an island in the Puget Sound, detached from distraction, and it has enriched my writing, given me the opportunity to prioritize and research, and send my work out into the world where what I send reflects what the theaters are looking for.

My voice as a writer is women-centric: what it is to be a woman in today’s society, how mental illness destroys a person and their relationships, how being older doesn’t mean your life isn’t rich and complicated, how friends can often do far more to help than the legal system will. I want other people who see and hear my stories to feel something, and to leave discussing that story and what it means to them, how it changed their view. This is the strength that is live theater, and where I feel most at home.