CONTRIBUTORS & THEIR WORKS |
Tools of the Trade
Photo by Weebly.com
Photo by Weebly.com
|
Soon after she retired from UCSF, a friend told Charlene Anderson about OLLI at SF State and she began taking classes. In 2015, in one of those classes, Mike Lambert suggested starting a literary and photography magazine at OLLI. So, Mike, Charlene and a small group of OLLI members, founded Vistas & Byways. It has been publishing stories, poems and nonfiction pieces, as well as photography, ever since. Charlene is pleased to be part of V&B which provides OLLI members an opportunity to be published.
|
Contributions to this Issue:
V&B Executive Coordinator, Publicity Poetry: All Aboard The Trouble with Time Photo Essay: Mississippi - River Out of Time; V&B Time Capsule: I Slept Through 9 - 11 |
|
Barbara Applegate received a BA at UC Berkeley, with a major in Spanish, and an MS in Education at CSU, East Bay. As an administrator of Early Childhood Education, she developed a program to teach parents in non-English speaking families the value of helping their children retain the home language while learning English. She is the mother of 3 daughters, a traveler, and a contemplative. She loves taking writing classes - not only because she learns from them, but because they give her structure for writing.
|
|
Jane Barrier is currently a retired computer programmer who has been living with MS for over 30 years. She enjoyed acting in local theaters until multiple sclerosis, diagnosed in 1990, curtailed her trodding the sidewalks, much less “the boards.” Thanks to OLLI instructors in poetry writing, and an offshoot group of students who formed to hear and comment on each others’ work, her feeling for poetry has been reinvigorated.
|
|
Barbara Barer, MSW, retired as a Senior Research Associate in the Division of Medical Anthropology at UCSF where she did pioneering work in the field of Gerontology. Her early research career included work on a seminal study of prison life at the London School of Economics, a Stress and Coping study at UC Berkeley, and culminated with a focus on aging issues at UCSF. She is the author of numerous articles on life in later years, covering such topics as grandparenting, divorcing families, men and women aging differently, health care needs of the elderly, and a long-term study of Bay Area residents aged 85 and older.
|
|
Joe Catalano recently reactivated his law license to increase opportunities to help save our democracy. He also takes pictures, writes and drives for fun. He enjoyed his first OLLI at SF State courses in the spring semester 2019, and has taken many writing courses, and several general interest classes since. He lives in San Francisco with his wife Joan.
|
Contributions to this Issue:
Member - Editorial Board |
|
Linda L. Day earned her PhD in urban policy from Syracuse University and her Masters in Architecture from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Dr. Day is Emeritus Professor of City and Regional Planning at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo. She teaches architectural and urban history for SFSU and UC Berkeley OLLI. As a San Francisco City Guide, she often goes on walks led by other guides. A recent walk in Golden Gate Park included seeing this statue of John McLaren.
|
|
Cathy Fiorello’s passions are food, Paris, and writing. A morning at a farmers’ market is her idea of excitement and visiting Paris is her idea of heaven. And much of her writing is about food and Paris. She worked in publishing in New York, freelanced for magazines during her child-rearing years, then re-entered the work world as an editor. She moved to San Francisco in 2008 and published a memoir, Al Capone Had a Lovely Mother. In 2018, she published a second memoir, Standing at the Edge of the Pool. Cathy has two children and four grandchildren. Her mission is to make foodies and Francophiles of them all.
|
|
Margaret Gannon is a retired attorney. Admitted to practice in 1975, she was the first woman west of the Mississippi representing injured railroad workers. Her calling for 40 years was representing women in Family Court. After years of legal briefs, she is learning poetry as a new language. OLLI instructors and OLLI poetry friends are fostering a spring of creativity and just plain fun.
Editor's Note: Ann Grogan is a first-time contributor to Vistas & Byways. |
|
Matt Ginsburg received an MFA degree in Creative Writing with a concentration in playwriting at San Francisco State University. His literary work explores his interest in business, economics, and politics. His plays have been read or performed at numerous theaters in San Francisco. He has also had three short stories and three works of memoir published in previous editions of Vistas & Byways. He serves on the Editorial Board of our publication and writes the PREVIEW section of each issue.
|
Contributions to this Issue:
Member - Editorial Board, Publicity Preview Fiction: State of the Union Nonfiction: Released |
|
A native of San Francisco, Kathryn Santana Goldman’s interest in poetry began when she was working in ICU as a registered nurse. She used this practice to process the variety of stressful scenarios experienced. Over the years, she has continued to experiment with different types of writing such as short stories and plays. As an avid traveler, Kathryn has become skilled at capturing photographs about the diversity she encounters. Three years ago, she began to combine her love of photography with her writing by using the images she captures as seeds for her poems. She continues to explore new ways to use these two art forms to share her experience with family and friends.
|
Contributions to this Issue:
Poetry: Moroccan Mirage Things to Do When You Don't Want to Leave Kintsugi Friendship |
|
Jane Bell Goldstein has held a variety of positions during her career, including salesperson, tour guide at San Francisco's Old Mint Museum, accountant, middle school teacher, and, during her 19 years with the Internal Revenue Service, half a dozen technical (tax law) jobs, all of which might fall under the general description of spirit guide to taxpayers through the fathomless bureaucracy. Since her retirement from government service in 2010, she has pursued interests in writing, bird-watching, genealogy, history, walks in the park, and, most recently, website construction as chief architect of the Vistas & Byways online venue. Jane is a graduate of San Francisco State University (BA History, 1974). She has a grown son and daughter and one grandson. She lives with her husband, Mark, in the Oakland hills.
|
|
Ann Grogan is a joyful octogenarian, retired lawyer, emerging writer and poet who lives in San Francisco. Her writing promotes the unequivocal permission to pursue one’s passions
at any age. Her poems have appeared in Little Old Lady, the University of Vermont’s Continuing Education Newsletter, and KAWL Public Media Bay Poets. Her poems are forthcoming in the fall editions of Querencia, The Prairie Review, and Amethyst Review. She’s the author of two volumes of poetry, Poetic Musings on Pianos, Music & Life and she invites readers to visit her music and poetry website, rhapsodydmb.com. Editor's Note: Ann Grogan is a first-time contributor to Vistas & Byways. |
|
Mary Heldman is retired from a career in medical school administration, computer programming, business systems analysis and technical writing. She grew up in Los Angeles but lived in Palo Alto, Washington D.C., Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Stony Brook, New York, before settling in San Francisco in 1974. She has been taking creative writing classes at OLLI since 2014 and wishes she lived with a gregarious chocolate lab or a contemplative mutt, but doesn’t.
|
Contributions to this Issue:
Member - Editorial Board, Publicity Poetry: Ode to Opposable Thumbs V&B Time Capsule Evening in Paris/Home in LA |
|
Vivian Imperiale has been writing since she was six. She now writes to process her emotions around homelessness, mental health, connections with the spirit world, and the loss of the Light of her Life to AIDS long ago. Her poems and prose have been published online, in magazines and in books. She has a BA in Psychology and an MA in Special Education.
|
|
Harvey Ingham lives in San Francisco with his wife, Jane Barrier (a V&B contributor), and their cat. He is very grateful to OLLI and its wonderful teachers for introducing him to writing poetry. He would like to thank the beautiful community of poets he has met through OLLI for their encouragement, and for brightening the world with their creativity.
|
|
Dr. Vera Jacobson was a teacher and administrator for 30 years. She is happily writing short stories, watercoloring, and doing pencil sketching. If she is not at home, you would probably find her sailing on the San Francisco Bay. She lives in Brisbane with her dog, Peter.
|
|
Mike Lambert led the effort to start Vistas & Byways in the fall of 2015. In an earlier life, he worked in the telecommunications industry for 35 years and taught at San Francisco State University’s College of Business for 15 years. He refutes the adage about old dogs and new tricks. He took up creative writing as a hobby at age 75. He self-published two novels and a collection of his short stories. His main fictional character is Jessica Jones, a single working girl in contemporary San Francisco. See his Author page at Amazon under the name of M. L. Lambert for more details. Mike now lives in a senior living facility in Carlsbad, CA. He says that the internet keeps him connected to some of his favorite activities in San Francisco, such as this issue of Vistas & Byways.
|
Contributions to this Issue:
Webmaster, Visual Arts Editor Photo Essay: V&B Covers From the Time Capsule |
|
Carol Langbort was a Professor of Education in Mathematics for 30+ years at SFSU, teaching teachers how to teach mathematics. She was Chair of the Department of Elementary Education, and for 15 years directed the SF Math Leadership Project, a professional development program for classroom teachers. She developed a master’s degree program in Mathematics Education. She is co-author of several books, including How to Encourage Girls in Math and Science and Building Success in Math. Recently, she was a volunteer for the de Young and Legion of Honor Museums. She is currently on the Board of Nicaragua Children’s Friendship Committee. She has studied Spanish for many years in language schools in Mexico and participates in the OLLI Spanish conversation group.
|
Contributions to this Issue:
Online proofreader |
|
Dan Liberthson was born in Rochester, New York and attended Northwestern University and SUNY at Buffalo (PhD, English). He has retired from a career as a medical writer, and lives in San Francisco and Cottage Grove, Oregon. He has published five books of poetry and has published individual poems in anthologies and journals, including The Haight-Ashbury Literary Journal, South Coast Poetry Journal, Elysian Fields Quarterly, Chaminade Literary Review and Triggerfish. He was Secretary of the Oregon Poetry Association (2019-2022), and took second place in the William Stafford Memorial Award Poetry Contest (2020) and the Maine Poets Society Contest (2022). He also published The Bluejay Contrivance, a spy novel, and The Golden Spider, a middle-grade fantasy novel. For more information, visit liberthson.com.
|
Contributions to this Issue:
Poetry: Banana Slug In a Room in a Courtyard in Firenze The Octopus Pot |
|
Wayne Lin is a member of OLLI at SF State, an Associate Member of the Academy of American Poets, as well as a member of the California State Poetry Society. His poetry has recently appeared in The Lyric, Poetry Quarterly, Ibbetson Street, California Quarterly, (California State Poetry Society), Wisconsin Review, Main Street Rag, Rosebud Literary Magazine, Loch Raven Review, Time of Singing poetry Journal and Chronogram Magazine. Wayne currently lives in California with his wife.
|
|
Richard Marino has lived in San Francisco since 1983. He moved to San Francisco from New York where he lived in the East Village. He has worked in the San Francisco Public Library (Main) for the past 28 years. He has been with the Gay Gray Writers since its inception in 2014. He joined the queer elders’ group four years ago which led to their having writings published in a one-time journal in November 2019. His pieces tend to be memoir, and he has written many of them. This opportunity with OLLI is an incredible blessing to him and he would like to participate in the future.
|
|
Karen Marker’s poetry has won awards through the Keats Soul-Making Literary Competition and the Ina Coolbrith Circle. She has been published in numerous anthologies and journals including The MacGuffin, The Monterey Poetry Review, The Haight Ashbury Literary Journal, Slant Poetry and World Peace. You can find out more about Karen’s writing and her first book Beneath the Blue Umbrella at:
https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/beneath-the-blue-umbrella-by-karen-marker/ |
|
Bruce Martin grew up in Boston, Massachusetts as one of three brothers. He completed undergraduate work at Keene State College in New Hampshire and received an M.A. degree in Urban and Regional Planning at the University of Massachusetts . He moved to San Francisco in 1986 where he worked for a long time in the financial publishing industry. He has always loved poetry, and since retiring from work has spent his leisure time in reading and writing poetry.
Editor's Note: Bruce Martin passed away in 2019. |
|
Jackie Davis Martin’s stories have been published in anthologies, as well as print and online journals; prizes for fiction were awarded by New Millennium, On the Premises, and Press 53, among others. In addition, she’s published two memoirs: Surviving Susan and Those Several Summers, as well as a novel, Stopgaps, and has just put together a story collection: A Life, Fictively. She enjoys the arts of San Francisco: SF Ballet, SF Opera, SF Symphony, the theaters.
|
Contributions to this Issue:
Member-Editorial Board, Publicity Launch Party MC Nonfiction: Me and Miss Brill |
|
MaryLee McNeal is retired from teaching. Her stories and poems have appeared in various magazines and anthologies, including Bellevue Literary Review and Green Mountains Review. Her novel, Home Again, Home Again won the San Francisco State’s Clark Award in 1989, and her poetry chapbook, The Space Between Us, won the Bear Mountains Press Award in 2002. A second chapbook of poems, The Way We Fall, with an introduction by Jack Hirschman, was published in 2014. She is seeking publication for a second novel, Saint Kate’s, revising a manuscript of linked stories, and recently enjoyed her first OLLI classes in memoir and poetry with Kathleen McClung.
Editor's Note: MaryLee McNeal is a first-time contributor to Vistas & Byways. |
Contributions to this Issue:
Nonfiction: Memory Poetry: Advice to the Aging Self Time Is Marching On |
|
MJ Moore lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her various incarnations have included technical writer and editor, farm apprentice, environmental activist, teacher, poet, wife, and mother. As a bicoastal being, she thrives on salt air, wind and waves, but also loves mountains, deserts, forests and streams. Writing for her is a source of vision and joy. Her book of poems, Topography of Dreams, was published by Blue Light Press in 2020.
|
Contributions to this Issue:
Member - Editorial Board Assistant Webmaster, Publicity Poetry: Departure Florida-Moon Central Genesis |
|
After becoming an attorney, Pamela Pitt graduated with an MFA (1990) from the San Francisco Art Institute. She showed her photography work nationally in group and solo shows. Seeking daylight after years in the dark room, she worked on collage with mixed media painting and photography. Ideas from social issues became the basis of certain collage series:
2014: ripped pages from a law book on the “Patriot Act” to use as collage elements. 2016: used tissue dress "Patterns" in a series about the place of women. 2017: produced a collage series based on the concept of making land a commodity. With her current focus on photography and scanner digital art, Pam works on achieving peace through creativity and beauty. |
|
Don Plansky wasn an active member of the OLLI at SF State interest group, the Writers Circle, for several years. He has also participated in many writer workshops at OLLI. In a former incarnation, he worked as a freelance journalist, contributing more than 200 articles to the Jewish Bulletin of Northern California, as well as book reviews for The Pacific World: Journal of the Institute of Buddhist Studies.
|
|
Daniel Raskin is a retired preschool teacher. He lives in Bernal Heights. Daniel writes with The Older Writers Laboratory at the Bernal library, The MERI Center at UCSF and Laguna Writers.
|
|
Amee Shah (PoetessDrAmeeShah) is a university professor and research scientist. She finds poetry and art to not only be personal expressions and medium to process her connection with the natural world, but also a powerful way to plug into the spiritual realm and receive gifts of wonder and awe, gratitude, a sense of abundance, and profound insights and creativity that further allow her to bring back into her work of teaching, coaching, and counseling. She has her first book of poetry published and received with wide interest. Her book is titled, Becoming the Light: From Angst to Awakening, available on Amazon.
|
|
Dennis Sides has been a software developer, book editor, professional musician, construction project manager, tech writer, and world traveler. He's hung up his traveling shoes during COVID, but hopes to get back out on the road soon. He's lived in the Fillmore long enough to qualify for "San Francisco native" status.
|
|
After owning and operating a theater and a health food store in Kona, Hawaii for ten years, Richard Simmonds moved with his family to San Francisco where he was the graphic designer for the San Francisco Marriott Hotel for 22 years. He retired in 2010 and has since been with OLLI at SF State. Earlier in his career he taught English at Verde Valley School in Sedona, at Ohio State University and at the University of California, San Diego.
Editor's Note: Richard was with the group of OLLI members who prepared the first issue of Vistas & Byways in 2015. He designed the V&B logo that we still use today - see below. He passed away in 2020. |
|
Barbara Stevenson is a retired nonprofit consultant and active church lady, author of Church Shopping in the Bay Area (Sasquatch Books). She was awarded second prize in 2022 for Religious Essay and third place in 2019 for Memoir Vignette by the Soul-Making Keats Literary Competition. This poem grew out of an OLLI poetry class with Kathleen McClung. She lives in San Francisco.
Editor's note: Barbara Stevenson is a first-time contributor to Vistas & Byways |
|
Work by Horehound Stillpoint (aka Greg Taylor) has been collected in over thirty anthologies including: Poetry Nation; Bullets & Butterflies; Bend, Don't Shatter; Sex Spoken Here; Pills, Thrills, Chills, and Heartache; Poetry Slam; and Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots? He self-published three chapbooks, Dovetail, The Inside Dirt, and Some Holy Googolplex. For 35 years, he has shared his poetry and other work live in theaters, bars, and coffee shops from Orange County and New Orleans to Vancouver and New York City. His poems have been taught at Harvard.
Editor's Note: Horehound Stillpoint is a first-time contributor to Vistas & Byways. |
|
Steve Surryhne was an Associate Lecturer in English Literature at San Francisco State University from 1993-2012. He is currently semi-retired and has recently returned to writing poetry. A native of San Francisco, he was a baby-beat in the sixties, knew some of the beat poets and is now a neo-beat. In his alternate career, he worked in Community Mental Health in San Francisco from 1979-2012. He took first place in the Jack Kerouac Poetry contest in 2015 and has published in The Blue Moon Review and Interpretations. He is currently working on a project with a photographer friend on poem-texts and photos.
|
|
Pat Usner is semi-retired, working as a fundraising advisor. After decades working in healthcare public relations in Philadelphia, she followed her passion, changed careers and moved to San Francisco 20+ years ago. She was drawn here by Pachamama Alliance—a nonprofit that partners with the Indigenous people of the Amazon to preserve their land and culture. Their vision of an environmentally sustainable, spiritually fulfilling, socially just human presence on this planet continues to guide her. Writing is in her blood. Both parents were journalists, and her degree is in Journalism. After decades working in public relations, marketing and fundraising, now she’s writing just for fun. Her writing is mostly reflective, how stories from her past inform who she is today.
Editor's Note: Pat Usner is a first-time contributor to Vistas & Byways. |
|
A retired physician, Corey Weinstein is a musician, poet, songwriter and clarinet player. He has published two CDs of original music inspired by the Klezmer and Yiddish stage musical traditions and led Umzist, a Klezmer band playing benefits for Jewish elders for more than a decade. He wrote and performed at various venues a singspiel, Erased: Babi Yar, the SS and Me to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the massacre at Babi Yar. He plays clarinet in the Or Shalom Jewish Community choir, with The Jamberries Jazz Band at Shabbat services at Rhoda Goldman Plaza, and with any chamber music group he can find. He lives in the Ingleside of San Francisco with his wife of 37 years, Pat Skala.
|
|
Joan Westley is a retired editor, developer, writer, and publisher of curriculum materials and textbooks for elementary school students. A former teacher, she produced teaching guides and authored articles and newsletters about best practices. After graduating from the University of Wisconsin in Madison with a BA in Psychology, she moved west to San Francisco, where she lived in various neighborhoods for the better part of 20 years. During that time, she earned a teaching credential and MA in Education from San Francisco State University and spent a year in London, England on a teacher exchange program. In the early 1990s, she adopted two Peruvian children as a single woman and raised them in a suburb south of San Francisco.
|
