ABOUT

During the majority my professional life, as a trainer and staff development specialist, I facilitated learning in the workplace to enable success in employees and individuals.  I viewed my professional mission to help people live one step beyond where they were each day.

At different journey points in my career I conducted organizational development, curriculum design, marketing and promotion, college teaching and advising, and initiated informal and formal learning communities. For the most part, I attained positions that no one had filled before; creating a job from scratch became my forte.

My favorite quote on writing (and life) comes from E. L. Doctorow. “Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.”

TRAVELS ALONE & THEN WITH MY HUSBAND

From fourteen to twenty-seven, I traveled as a young girl and single young woman. I traveled by train across Arkansas alone as a fourteen-year-old girl. At fifteen I traveled to seven European cities and attended the Seventh Baptist Youth World Conference. Then at seventeen and nineteen, I lived in Hawaii and Salt Lake City, Utah, which were different cultures within my own United States. And at age twenty-seven, I put everything on my back and trekked through Great Britain and Ireland. These journeys set the stage for independence and interdependence, both necessary to a healthy marriage.

Over more than thirty-five years with my husband Lynn, we traveled to unique places for different purposes and typically for extended stays, often based on his work assignments.

• We accompanied twenty-four 4-H students on an exchange trip to Japan and the two of us experienced living with a family of seven in 600 square feet for a month (1985).
• Lynn and I attended his international conference and an agricultural                           tour in Ireland for two weeks (2001).
• We team taught a week-long inservice training for MangosuthuTechnikon faculty in South Africa, then attended a conference, cultural tours, and a photographic safari, totaling three weeks. (2002)
• We vacationed after his work was completed in France two years in a row (2003 and 2004) and in Australia (2005) for two weeks each time.
• We spent three weeks in Costa Rica (2007) with a team to plan an international conference for the following year, experiencing the country end-to-end and coast-to-coast.
• I traveled with Lynn after my retirement to Turkey on a university agricultural assignment of his consulting job for three weeks (2008).
• In 2015, we visited friends who are natives of Lima, Peru, exploring the city, conducting a volunteer seminar on Experiential Learning at a local university and attending our host family’s daughter’s first communion.
• And finally, we have traveled to Mexico (both west and Caribbean coasts) for over thirty years each year to vacation. We settled on Isla Mujeres since 1990 every year. Recently I travelled with girlfriends from the island to tour San Miguel de Allende, MX in 2015 and San Cristóbal, MX in 2016.

BLOGGING

My writing, a lifelong dream now realized in retirement, gives me a chance to share about my travels, reflections, and current ideas about travel; however, I realize many people will never get the opportunity to travel as I have. For me the concept of “travel” is to open oneself to new people, different ideas, unfamiliar experiences – all of which can happen at home or wherever we find ourselves.

• Think of “travel” as traveling by books, what we read.
• Consider travel as taking a conscious walk in your neighborhood.
• Take the time to attend a community event you wouldn’t typically and reflect on it as a travel experience.
• Make friends with a person from another country in your hometown.

You don’t have to go around the world and back. Find the unfamiliar in your own backyard.

When I think about the title of the blog I recognize that finding ourselves is the first developmental task as babies, finding our thumb. In the same way, we realize the difference between baby-self and mom, or the larger world. It also gets bigger and wider over time. At every stage of development we find a different part of ourselves and a deeper self. To develop the knowledge and skills for finding ourselves at home in this world is our life-long undertaking, one baby step at a time. I hope we can do this together.

THE CRAFT OF WRITING & PUBLISHING

As an adult educator and trainer, I want to share with you what I am learning about the craft of writing (and sometimes travel writing specifically) and the publication process. You will see blog posts about these topics. See the website menu item entitled, “Workshops” for descriptions and content.

NEXT STEPS FOR YOU

Order <Song of Herself> on Amazon

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• Add an idea or comment in reply to my posts or someone else’s comment
• Read my book and comment here, or better yet, review it on Amazon, Good Reads, or Facebook
• Follow some of the links I offer that are of interest to you
• Invite me to your book club or other group for a book reading and/or signing
• Attend or invite me to conduct any workshops listed on my website

Join me often, enjoy and share the journey of finding yourself at home in the world. I hope to see your name and hear your voice often on this website and blog.

Gratefully,

Rhonda