All That I Am

I am presenting my autobiographical book, "All That I Am." I am a forty-four year-old African-American woman -- teacher, poet, painter, and sculptor -- a graduate of the Pratt Institute and the first member of my family to graduate. For two years, a curator for the Society Of The Muse Of The Southwest. The idea of writing an autobiography came to me in 1996, after a near-fatal car accident. Coming so close to death inspired me not only to piece my life together, as would any human being, but to tell others the soul-crushing story of the life that I once lived, whose nature I finally came to fathom for the first time in my life. The narrative begins in 1962 literally, at my conception. It begins with the perspective of an unborn child caught in the abortion of a twin sibling, and finally born into an African-American family, whose roots reach back to 1926. None of the subjects thereafter are easy: family violence (both moral and physical), abortion, racism, sexual dysfunction and homosexuality, and plain being poor in America. However, I wanted to tell this story in a life-affirming fashion. My story is that of countless other people, my message simple: none of us can survive on our own, we need the life-giving nourishment of love. This is about love both denied and requited.