Writing grew from love of books

Writing comes naturally to me. I grew up loving books. Hours passed as I devoured romantic tales of kings and queens, adventures of the wild west, exotic travel stories. The public library in our small California town was tucked into a corner of the Veterans Hall along with various civic offices. Silence was strictly enforced, except for the creaky old wooden floorboards. Thanks to my mom for introducing me to the pleasures of reading.

Eager to get to the ending, I developed the habit of fast reading and still scan a page quickly. It took me until after college at University of California, Berkeley, and a real estate career in San Francisco, to realized that I loved to write. It happened because of an earthquake in San Francisco. I call it an “accelerator moment” because the shock and disruption created a desire for change in me. I decided to become a travel writer, joined the Bay Area Travel Writers (BATW), and later served as President.

I worked hard developing my writing style, helped out by BATW, and loved the art of it. To me, composing a piece of writing is like stringing beads to make a necklace. When all the important parts are collected and arranged in the proper sequence, it becomes a thing of beauty.

Golf travel writing around the world

I specialized in golf around the world, the game, the destinations, and the lifestyle that unites people from many different cultures. While writing was a new skill, I had played golf all my life. Over a 20-year span, I’ve teed it up in Marrakech, played through the cobras in Penang, and navigated fairway bomb craters in Biarritz. Assignments took me to exotic locales, where I played golf and wrote about the game and industry leaders for national and international publications.

Editing came naturally

It turned out that I possessed natural editing abilities, which complemented my writing. It was really no surprise. Classmates had always sought my help to finalize schoolwork. Business colleagues asked me so often to “please look this over” that I became the go-to person. Now that I have developed those abilities into a professional skill set, I find that I like editing as much as writing.

Writing personal bios

After years of doing interviews, I learned how to read people and glean the information I needed for my assignments. I love talking to people and hearing their stories. Expanding the practice, I developed the technique of writing bios for individuals. The bios are used for websites, LinkedIn, company directories, speech introductions, and many other purposes. I use similar skills to write press releases to publicize people and events.

Looking back, it seems that my writing and editing career has developed in a logical manner, but I did not know at the time where it was heading. I just followed what I loved to do.

Associations
Arizona Golf Association (AGA), banquet speaker
(AGA) Arizona Golf Foundation Hall of Fame Voting Delegation, awards presenter

Sisterhood of Happiness, Advisory Council

Desert Village Homeowners Association, Vice President

Southwest Golf Media Association, founder, scholarship awards presenter 2004-2010

Volunteering
Scottsdale Sister Cities, Haikou China Committee

Golf Fore Charity, promotion

Coaches vs Cancer, event coordination

Bay Area Travel Writers, created travel mascot program for schoolchildren