Biography

I was born in Cleveland, Ohio USA, but my parents had the good sense to get out of the cold when I was still a toddler. We first moved to Seattle WA, then south to New Orleans LA, finally settling in Houston TX when I was 8 years old. I worked for many years in a medical laboratory-first as a lab tech, then secretary and eventually administrator. While working full-time, I went back to college and graduated from the University of Houston with a BS in Psychology. I thought that I would continue on to get a doctorate in clinical psychology, but the death of my mother was a watershed moment for me. She spent her entire life putting off her heart's desires until some indeterminate time in the future, which sadly never came. That motivated me to choose a different path. Her unspent nest egg allowed me to fulfill my dreams. I become a scuba instructor, got into underwater photography and traveled the world so that I could live my life without regrets.

At the age of 44, I had an amazing opportunity to pursue my passion of underwater photography. I left Houston to take a job in the Cayman Islands working with Scuba Diving Hall of Fame's Cathy Church. I learned so much from her and had the chance to share that knowledge with students from all over the world.

In 2011, I moved to the other side of the world to live in Bali, Indonesia. I had hoped to start a business teaching underwater photography here, but things didn't work out as expected. I taught English online and only got to dive occasionally. Ironically, I had been able to dive more when I lived in Houston than I did my first 5 years in Bali. Something had to change or I might as well go back to the states.

So in February of 2017, I decided it was more important for me to be close to the diving than to be close to anything else, and I moved to Pemuteran, in the remote northwest part of Bali. Now I'm 10 minutes away from amazing local reefs and less than 30 minutes away from the gorgeous walls of Menjangan Island. In May, I got a new camera system to better capture the biodiversity that is Indonesia, and I've finally put together this website to share my images with the world.