I was born in the Washington, DC area. My mother is an educator. I like to say she was raced by matriarchal committee. My father is a loud, Gullah, man who loves to tell stories. My early years were filled with family road trips, cousins and church. I started writing as a kid. My second-grade teacher, the elegant Mrs. Jacobs, introduced me to the C.S. Lewis’s “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” and it stayed with me. She began my love of reading and fiction. However, the storyteller in me comes from both sides of my family and goes back to relatives I’ve never met. My mother always had books by black authors. I suspect she knew the school curriculum would cover the others. She exposed me to Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston and countless poets. Eventually, the schools gave me Shakespeare, Judy Blume and Robert Frost. I was a teen in DC during the late ‘80’s early ‘90’s. I saw a lot of violence and cruelty however, books and being creative saved me. I performed around the city with acting groups and as an orator. I won awards from Mayor Marion Berry for reciting speeches and debates. I lobbied Capitol Hill for DC statehood. I took dance classes and sang in several choirs. I was lucky enough to have a vice principal, Mr. Davis (no relation) take an interest in me and send me to a teen video production program. I learned the nuts and bults of production from Harry Davis (again, no relation). He was the person who made filmmaking an option. I’ve always been an artist. I eventually attended Pratt Institute for film. Unfortunately, I couldn’t afford to finish but I continued taking photography when I moved back to DC. I had several mentors in photography during those years.

I also wrote plays and screenplays sometime partnering with other people. I landed in southern California in 2000. I originally lived in the famous Orange County for the first year. It was a culture shock. I was the only black women everywhere I went. I was called the N-word and everything else. Strangers would violate my space and touch me and my hair. The light in that tunnel was the group of friends I made who became my defenders and protectors. I moved to LA after that and worked three jobs along with doing freelance photography when I could. I lived there for many years and had the revelation that I am an east coaster. I moved back and started working in retail. I learned about running a business. At Lord & Taylor, I went from brand specialist to the first and only event coordinator after seeing a need. At the time, I was also writing for a men’s fashion website called Best Dressed Man on The Planet. I used all my skills there. I wrote, photographed, coordinated events and built the former online store. After years of that, I was laid off and then the pandemic happened in the same few weeks. I have never been that still. As a DC native, we can go to museums free and walk the gorgeous streets around the area seeing new things all the time. We couldn’t and an unknown, unseen, undetectable sickness was lurking somewhere. For the first time I had nothing to do and no where to go. I wasn’t shielded from the history of black America and my mother showed me documentaries and gave me books though out my life. The world changed and I took classes. I tried a few new things and then I wrote a book. I am a Fashion Yodea, a photographer, an event planner, a storyteller and an author.