A major goal in my life is to take advantage of the opportunities presented, whether self-created or coming of their own accord. Life abounds with opportunities to learn, not just from the big events like falling in love or the loss of a loved one, enjoying health or dealing with sickness, but with the little rituals, as well, that fill the hours and minutes of each day. Our thoughts and feelings together create the intricate infrastructure of our consciousness, and these and more—so much more—combine to form the fine fabric of the magic that is life. In the end, I hope to be able to say: Thank you for everything; I’ve done my best to learn from it all.

That learning can sometimes feel negative, as well as positive. Every human being experiences both, and I am no exception. From childhood in the mid 1940’s in a gritty, working-class town just north of Albany, New York, with its predominance of Catholicism and its ethnic enclaves, to life in a monastery beginning at age fourteen, to being a university student in France during the heady days of the counter-culture in 1968, I have had multiple opportunities to learn. Moving to Los Angeles in the mid-1970’s, I studied yoga and continue to meditate today, as I have each day for the past forty years. And in so doing, I have been fortunate enough to discover my own Spirit Guides.

But who doesn’t yearn for human love, too? I did, and finally I found it when I met my life-partner, Andrew, in 1980. We have now been together for more than thirty-five years, actually getting married when we were able to in 2013.

My work career has followed its own trajectory. Having taught foreign languages in high school, and then English as a Second Language to adults, I eventually went on to became an assistant vice president for international programs at a university. Now retired, I am finally able to dedicate myself to one of my great loves, writing, and have published my first book, After the Devastation, a post-apocalyptic novel of love, environmental and nuclear disaster, political intrigue, and magical mysticism. I also regularly post essays on my blog site, Two Old Liberals, as well as write short stories and poetry. And so, the learning goes on. My job as an author of fiction is to create vibrant characters who live in interesting times and then, as parents do when sending their children off, to let them make their way out into the wider world.

Whatever else lies ahead, I can only hope to be ready and up to the task. Even after seventy years on this beautiful planet, which has its own kind of consciousness, I know I’ve experienced only a fraction of what there is yet to learn. Beyond that, being thankful for everything given to me, doing my best to remain creative, and trying always to stay open to the wonders of the world may well be challenges enough of their own.