My academic degrees are in Cultural Anthropology and Depth Psychology. (For those who are interested, I have Level 2 training in Internal Family Systems.) I worked in the field of Conflict Resolution for 30 years, in nonprofit and academic settings. These years of study and professional experience have cultivated in me a deep and abiding respect for the diversity, breadth and depth of human experience; the complexities within and between identities; the dynamics of domination; and the need for deep listening and witness.

My own ancestors lived in what is now northwestern Europe. Immigrants to North America came from Germany, Ireland, and Scotland in the 18th and 19th centuries, in the wake of religious persecution, military conscription, and famine. Each of my lineages were, in different ways, driven from their own ancestral lands, and each of them were subsequently involved, directly or indirectly, in the displacement of indigenous American populations. The immigrants' descendants converged in central Ohio, and that is where I was born. I live now on unceded Ohlone land on the central coast of California, near Santa Cruz. Here, the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band, comprised of the descendants of indigenous people taken to local missions during Spanish colonization of the central coast, is working to restore traditional stewardship practices and heal from historical trauma.