Welcome
Well, I don’t know how you begin introducing yourself to anyone, so I’m just going to 
start out by giving you a list of my very favorite things. Here they are:
- My husband John
- My family
- My six cats
- Reading and writing, and anything beautiful that goes with them, such as books, pens, paper, pencils and handwriting
- Paris
- Portland, Oregon
- Coffee, especially Indonesian, and all the coffee rituals, such as great, relaxed conversation
- The ocean
- Mystery (in novels, in life)
- Travel
- yeah, Yankees
All combinations of these, such as having Sumatran coffee in Paris at an outdoor café with my husband John, and alternating between reading and writing with the beautiful pen he bought me in Florence. You get the idea.
I’m a professor of Romance Languages, specializing in French and Spanish language and experimental literature. In the past five years I have also been involved in civility studies, and have become certified. At the moment I am in the process of starting an online civility journal, which I hope to get running by the end of 2009.