Employment / Career Choices

My current careers include working as an artist. I've participated as a painter, photographer and sculptor in The Ann Arbor Art Fair; was a full-time vendor for two (April to December) seasons in the Ann Arbor Artisans Market. There have been multiple gallery exhibitions of my work in Michigan, Kentucky and West Virginia. Google the word 'Feathabees' and you'll find my writing, sculpting and art blog.

I've also worked as a developmental therapist. Beginning in 1991, I worked with the top one percent of all developmentally disabled infants, young adults, children and adults in a suburb of the Chicago area. I started as a Certified Nursing Assistant and worked my way up through Critical Care units to the Developmental Therapy level. I did this work for a total of 13 years and learned invaluable lessons about the resilience and strength of the human spirit, but the death rate was so high in this particular population that eventually I had to step away. I went back to school, and earned a Belushi Scholarship in Theater Arts, also studying Fine Art as well as private vocal training.

The poetic and musical habits of my childhood have joined forces to become a sort of fantasy-folkish style. I'm currently in the recording studio putting together a double album, one as an audio companion to the world of the Feathabees, another being a compilation of personal indie-folk songs I've written from my own life experience. I play acoustic guitar and sing, and in the past I have played the piano quite seriously. You can listen to some of my recent music at a site called 'Reverbnation' by looking up my name on the site's homepage.

When I came to live in Ann Arbor in 2005, I decided to work freelance with developmentally challenged children in private residential care. This gave me time to paint, write music and pursue my other creative goals. As I began to receive care referrals. I found myself surrounded by more and more developmentally 'normal' children, and currently I serve two families (having served as many as four at once in the past). I manage the households, walk the dogs, cook the meals, do the laundry, drive the children to outings and house- and pet-sit while the folks are away on vacation. I've been adopted as an honorary relative by every family I've served.

A future career: At the moment I've gone back to school to be certified as a Personal Trainer through study with the International Sports Sciences Association. I'm already passing all the required quizzes, loving the field of study and absorbing lots of information regarding fitness, health and nutrition. This shift in career focus didn't come lightly, arriving after I had been mistaken for the personal trainer in my current gym about a hundred times. Eventually a gym owner offered me a job while I worked out as a guest in his facility, and by then I figured the Universe was trying to tell me something. I'll most likely work in a local gym in Oregon, and continue to earn certifications in Strength and Conditioning, Fitness and Sports Nutrition and Children's and Geriatrics Fitness.

Some unexpected and yet very rewarding jobs and 'callings' that have found me later in life include being hired as a house whisperer / organizer, a muralist, an illustrator, and a puppeteer.

The winter has set in fully at last - with snow, frigid nights, bright glorious days. Already it's 2013, the year I move west. Just where I'll end up and just when are still a mystery, but I'm on an ever-ascending staircase. My fitness regiment is still strict, and I've gone on a wonderful new journey of nutrition, experimenting with a high protein weight-lifters diet. The results have shown improvements in my workout recovery, in my muscle definition, and in my metabolism. I still can't wait to get to the gym for my run, and look forward to seeing all the great people who are regulars there - we share a passion, after all, and the smiles we exchange are a huge part of my social uptake.

 I've gone into the studio, at last, to record my original ideas, after performing other people's music for more than thirty  years. Every part of the experience has been eye-opening and magical.

While I've never been a social media person, I have recently uploaded some of my music on Reverbnation, learning to link the site to Facebook and Twitter. In a matter of hours I had fans and listeners, and it amazed me to think that putting myself out there in that form would attract people so quickly. I continue to work toward two very different albums with vastly varied themes (one for the music of the 'real' world, and one for the music of my imagined realm, Mirico). I've been fortunate to work with an amazing array of people, and I can only imagine the interactions will continue to bring me learning opportunities.

The interesting thing about recording my own ideas is that the initial listen, away from the studio, found me awestruck - I could do nothing but dance and whoop and could barely sit still. After a while, I listened to the same tracks and felt a sense of deflation, and I thought, 'wow, I could do so much better than that!' Later, however, it seemed I came around, and saw the takes from the early stages as good stepping stones toward greater things. In some cases I scrapped what I had originally done, seeing clearly that I hadn't yet found myself and my 'sound'. Other times I realized the very first (and very early stage of) a take had the magic, where I did something instinctual, or where I harnessed a magic by not over-thinking the song too much. I continue to figure things out one session at a time, and while I don't know where all of this creation may lead, I know it's what I've always been meant to do.