Various lifestyles I’ve lived

Maybe it’s a good thing we didn’t have selfies through most of it. Most of those shots would have no doubt been embarrassing now.

So here’s how my life’s shaken out in terms of lifestyles.

1. Straight ‘50s middle class: Growing up in the Midwest.
2. Hippie: From college to Upstate New York and various moves thereafter, including my first marriage to an emerging visual artist. Well, this does fuel my novels Daffodil Uprising, Pit-a-Pat High Jinks, and Subway Visions.
3. Monastic: The rogue yoga ashram in the Pocono mountains. See my novel Yoga Bootcamp.
4. Ascetic: In many ways, this was still hippie as I lived in a loft in a small downtown in a place resembling what I’ve called Prairie Depot.
5. And back-to-the earth: The next move was a return to my college, this time as a research associate position before leaping on to the interior Pacific Northwest, one with my personal life filled with growth as a published poet, a shift to Quaker spiritual practice, and immersion in backwoods and wilderness wonder. These inspire my novels Nearly Canaan and The Secret Side of Jaya.
6. William Morris: Steel mill region in what one called the Near East, aka the Rust Belt. Included a divorce and rebound. Hometown News arises in that experience.
7. Nearly Plain Quaker slash Muppie: The Mennonite Urban Professionals I was hanging out with in Baltimore were the less expensive version of Yuppies. Living in a federal-style brick rowhouse in the Bolton Hill neighborhood was the culmination of my big-city dreams. During the week, I was often on the road with a company car and expense account. This was a rich mix for me, a time of much personal growth, ending in a self-gifted sabbatical year hunkered down in a suburb in which I drafted early versions of much of my fiction.
8. Yuppieville on the Hill: Relocating to New Hampshire, I wound up living in a complex where I rented a small townhouse. Back in the working ranks rather than management, I was freed from long unpaid overtime hours and the neckties and suits of my earlier professional situations. Contradancing, especially, steeped me in Boston, an hour to the south, while I immersed my personal writing in poetry circles. My love life had many ups and downs.
9. City farmer: Remarriage prompted my move to the New Hampshire Seacoast, where we bought an old house within easy walking distance of downtown and the Quaker Meeting. That “farmer” label actually befits my spouse, the avid gardener. The property also had the small carriage house you know as my Red Barn. Retirement included serious choral singer and daily swimmer roles.
10. Island author: We needed to downsize, which led to the remote fishing village with a lively arts scene you’ve been reading about here.