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I was raised on a cattle ranch in Northern California (outside a town called Lincoln, which is now part of an enormous sprawl). I taught myself to ride a horse at the age of six, as no one had the time to teach me--they were all busy learning how to irrigate, how to cajole an angry bull into another field, how to pull a calf . . . . Afraid of heights, and absolutely sure I was going to die, I managed to scramble up on the back of a very patient and lazy strawberry roan destrier, and plod off into the sunset.
Thereafter, I spent much of my early life on horseback, or so far buried into a book that the rest of the world ceased to exist (much to the annoyance of my family--it took several attempts to get my attention). We all had very specific jobs on the ranch and mine was horses and cattle--out rounding up at dawn. And since I rode bareback, my standing request was to wake me up 5 minutes before everyone else headed for the barn--time enough to dress and eat my Wheaties, and no sleep time wasted on saddling.
After high school, I attended college after college, racking up a BA and MA in creative writing and a Ph.D. in literature and theory. My very patient and supportive husband and now one enormous lap dog (malamute) have traisped across the midwest and back to Montana for me (though my husband insists that he's been running and hiding and I just keep finding him), where I now teach at the University of Montana-Western. Tony and I also have a five-year-old son, Quentin, who in our humbly unbiased opinions, is the most wonderful son ever produced, and one-year-old daughter, Sydney, who is the most wonderful daughter ever produced.
I have a fascination for the Victorians, weather, geology, horses, plants and mythology, I like spicy food, chocolate and cheesecake, and I have an odd sense of humor (or so I've been told. Often.) Incidentally, the Pharaoh is in fact my real name, and oddly enough, is of British origin. In the above picture, the white dog is Sierra, still gracing us with her pushy presence, and Dusty, who died a couple years ago of very old age.
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