If you don't know about me, here's a little history. I was born in Dallas, Texas, way back when horny toads still roamed the North Texas plains and the ozone layer covering the earth was still intact. Daddy was a CPA, and Momma was a registered nurse (although she had the awesome responsibility of staying home to raise four children and starching and ironing white shirts all day). From Dallas we detoured for a year in Lubbock, where it rained mud and wind whipped so hard it stripped the paint right off the cars. Luckily, we moved on to Houston, where it just rained rain…a LOT of rain!
        Life in Houston was good. My best friend, Leslie, lived two doors down; my big brother, Curtis, was a budding jazz musician; my beauty queen sister, Karen, was on her way to becoming a big business tycoon; I was voted the most popular junior high school girl at church (Wow!); and my little brother, Collin, was on his way to all-star baseball fame. Life for all of us was right on target…that is, until Daddy died of cancer, throwing every one of us right out of orbit.
        Aggieland, here we come! As Curtis and Karen were trying to find their ways in this world, Momma, Collin, and I moved to College Station. Grandma was there, and so were Momma's brothers. Grandpa had taught at Texas A&M University for 42 years, but he had died just a few short months before Daddy. A&M Consolidated High School wasn't the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts in Houston where I had planned to attend. Still, I was lucky enough to sing in the choir, dance on the drill team, and have a hunky handsome boyfriend. My high school days were the best. I had the best friends and the best times. Unfortunately, I eventually had to graduate and begin another chapter of my life.
        Reaching adulthood was no picnic for me. I wanted to remain forever young. Also, I had planned my entire life to be a singer in Carnegie Hall. There were roadblocks. One was lack of money, another was that I didn't want to leave my family (I had lost enough family), and the last was that I was just plain scared. I chose the shortest path, which looking back, set me on a course that would take me farther and farther away from the road to music that I had started on 18 years earlier. I attended Texas A&M University because it was right down the street. Bad move. There was no music department, although I did get to perform in the musical, "Carnival." Some other bright moments came out of that time at A&M. My dear friend, Kim Moore, and I started a comedy singing duo called the Rudd Sisters. We traveled all over Texas, singing great hits like "You're the Hangnail of my Life" and "Tennessee Birdwalk." Those were the days! Our best gig was performing for the Texas Cemetery Association in Houston. (Who would have thought they'd be such a lively bunch!)
        Something else good to come out of my Aggie years was my song writing. Many of the songs I sing today were written back in those days of young adult angst. Seems like I had lots of it back then. Little did I know then that what I felt as angst was only scratching the surface of what was later to come in my life.
Dissatisfaction with A&M and a cute boyfriend sent me packing off to Nacogdoches, Texas, and Stephen F. Austin State University. The smaller school took away some of my blues. I went there to study music finally, but I soon found out that classical music was NOT my calling. I did, however, get to play a harem girl in "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum." Oh, I loved the stage! I must say, too, that I fell in love in Nacogdoches…and with a Yankee from Connecticut! After a road trip from Texas to New England with one working windshield wiper, I should have guessed that relationship was headed for disaster. Besides, nobody in Connecticut ate grits. How could I ever live in such a place? Another honey down the tubes.
        After finally graduating from Stephen F. with a degree in Spanish and English, I wound up Teaching English as a Second Language in Houston. Here began my love affair with the international community. Most of my students were Vietnamese refugees, and I loved them all. The stories they told me! They recounted horrendous tales of escaping under gunfire, only to wind up in cramped refugee camps. Sharing this experience with me was my wonderful friend and co-worker, Marsha Smith. Being poor school teachers, we discovered every bar in town that had a free "happy hour buffet." We survived on many a cold shrimp and cheap cocktails.
        From Houston, I eventually moved on to teach in Plano and Navasota. Four years of teaching public school literally had me running for the border. Ahhhh, Mexico! It called me and I answered. I spent a year and a half teaching at the American School of Tampico. The people were warm and friendly and the food was out of this world. Life was good…until I got Typhoid Fever. (If you see me today and wonder why my eyes are green and not brown like they were when I was a kid, well, you can thank Typhoid for that. I still get confused looking in the mirror.)
        Despite contracting Typhoid Fever, something good came out of that experience. My work there helped me to get a teaching position with the English Language Institute at Texas A&M. I was finally teaching at a big university! I thought I had really hit the big time. My paycheck didn't reflect that I had hit the BIG TIME, but I was at A&M, nonetheless. This was the school of my grandfather, my father, my brothers, my cousins, and me. How cool! There I taught students from all over the world, countries I had never even heard of. During that time I managed to get my Master's degree in Education from Texas A&M University.
        As restless as I am, having a good job wasn't enough. It was time to get married. Here's a piece of advice: Never get married just because you think it's time to get married. You need a much better reason than that, you know, like maybe the guy won $60 million in the Texas Lottery. Now that's a real reason to get married! Anyway, I lost my money, I lost my home, I lost my beautiful step-children, I nearly lost my mind, but I survived that marriage. Let me just say this. If you are a big fan of Budweiser, don't come knocking on my door.
        I had had it. It was time to leave the country again. My boss at A&M kindly allowed me to escape for a semester. This time the Pacific Ocean was calling. That was about as far away as I could get from home. Adios, Texas A&M. Howdy, College of Micronesia! If you've ever wondered what a tropical paradise is like, well, I'm not the one to tell you. Pohnpei, Micronesia was an unbelievably beautiful but terrifically scary place. On the surface, it looked every bit like paradise, but closer examination showed a wicked streak of alcoholism and violence. However, in her defense, I will say that Pohnpei had the most fabulous sunsets, glorious tropical birds and foliage, and the best open air bars on the planet. Interesting ex-patriots make their homes on tropical islands. I guess we were all running to or from something.
My semester in paradise brought me right back to A&M. And this time I fell in love for real and married a handsome dentist from Colombia. He swept me off my feet and right into a penthouse apartment in the Andes Mountains in Bogota. This was more like it! Living in Colombia was very interesting but very hard. It is a beautiful country, but it is not a safe country. That and poor economic conditions brought us back home and back to A&M. And by golly, by age 40, I was finally pregnant! I had waited a lifetime for that. Life was good…until my husband left me when I was eight months pregnant. With the support of the most caring friends and family in the world, and through a large hole in my abdomen, my little Nicolas made it into the world.
        Today, I continue to work at the English Language Institute, Nicolas is growing like a weed, I sing whenever I get the chance, and I still have the most wonderful friends and family in the world. Life is good!

Hobbies:

Music:
Music is still a huge part of my life. For the past 15 years I have been singing with the Brazos Valley Chorale. I also sing with the BVC Singers and I am the Community Outreach board member. Check out our concert schedule at www.bvchorale.org.

Writing:
I have discovered in my old age that creativity will and must find an outlet. I've been writing all of my life, but in the past five years or so, I have become passionate about writing. It's Motherhood…What'd You Expect? is soon to be published. Also, I have a Christmas story working its way through the publishers right now. In addition, I have written a series of children's stories about observable night sky objects. Other than that, I have my collection of songs, short stories and poems.

Christmas books:
When I'm not singing, I'm out collecting Christmas books. Christmas books bring me joy and happiness…and take up a heck of a lot of wall space. If you have any old Christmas books you wish to dispose of, send them my way!

Rocks and gemstones:
I also have a passion for collecting rocks and gemstones. Unfortunately, my pocketbook doesn't allow me to collect diamonds.

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