Before I was eight, I accused my parents of being Russian Spies who had kidnapped me from my real parents. Perhaps it was because my mom wore a cobalt blue cape lined in emerald satin. She carried a black fur muff pinned with a big jeweled broch, like the lady in the movie, Dr. Zhivago. My dad drove a sports car with our Sheepdog in the passenger seat. They were just too exotic for our rural middle-class neighborhood in Redmond Washington. Family memories are of skiing and sailing and the beaches of the Pacific Northwest. Our Summer vacations followed Highway One through the Sacred Forests of Northern California. Her Trees of Mystery, and her velvety emerald coastlines weave in and out of my journals and my stories. When I got older, I chose a career as a Private Chef & Yacht Chef, sailing with clients through the San Juan and Canadian Islands with a camera and a toolbox full of knives. Now, I live somewhere between The Emerald Forest and the Sea under the Constellation of Cygnus, the Swan in the Northern Sky.