The Book Journey

Surprise Ending

Motherhood was going to be my “Happily Ever After.” For many women, love and marriage are the envisioned happy ending. For me, the dream was not riding off on a white horse with prince charming; it was skipping into the sunset behind the wheels of a baby stroller. I never liked riding horses anyway! Luckily I did find a prince (or close enough), love and marriage, and nearly two years into the marriage, after...

Book Journeys

There are two books I would like to write. One is the saga of my misspent late teens and twenties. Ungrounded and insecure, I navigated my way through the entertainment business as a model and actress. It was a profession with huge ups and downs, and one for which I was ill-suited. This tale would depict experiences I had that epitomized a hedonistic era, living with international models at Eileen Ford’s Upper...

Blue Sky Thinking

“Take the mobile off the bed, take care of their needs, and leave them alone.” This odd sentence was my introduction to Magda Gerber and the child care philosophy that would become my passion. I had given birth a few months before reading this quotation, the only one by Gerber, in an article in L.A. Parent magazine about raising a creative child. I remember nothing else about the article, but I could not get...

Baby Manipulator

I have a confession: I’m not gushy about babies! Oh, I like babies very much, and I love my own children. But I have never been the type of person who oohs and aahs and begs to hold a baby. Instead, I find infants and toddlers to be interesting people and, perhaps because I hold that view, babies seem fond of me. When you respect an infant, he senses it immediately. Let me illustrate. I once entered an elevator to...

Lessons in Acting, Parenting and Life

My acting career was a white-knuckle ride. Whether I was auditioning for a B-movie or acting in a TV guest shot, I felt deep down that I did not belong in the entertainment business. Acting was not my calling. Rather, it was a lifestyle choice that by sheer chance had chosen me. I possessed only modest talent, suffered from a debilitating lack of confidence, and accepted whatever roles came my way. My insecurity and...