Patricia Kirby

Eventually, the egg acquiesced, and I came along a little more than nine months later. I was a bit late--as my mother so likes to remind me--a pattern that has persisted all my life.

I was a weird kid. Girls, at least in my day, were supposed to wear pretty dresses and play with dolls. I cut Barbie's hair off and lost interest in her soon after. Usually, I could be found mucking about in the dirt, watching insects. By ten, I probably knew more about ants than some entomologists.

When I hit school age, I discovered that little girls who liked bugs, were lonely little girls. Thus began twelve years of playacting. All that fitting-in may have wrecked havoc on my self-esteem (hate that term), but it did wonders for my writing. The ability to read a situation and act like I belong, has served me well in building characters and writing dialogue. Anyway, after twelve forgettable years in the Texas public school system, I graduated.

Higher education happened at New Mexico State University, where I had a love/hate thing with engineering. Hate, because it was too much work. Love, because it was the only thing that challenged me. I graduated during a hate phase with a degree in...something.

I did a couple of years of graduate school, never finished my thesis, but in the process I met a guy. In what had to be a fit of insanity, that guy asked me to marry him and I, not stupid, readily agreed. He's been stuck with me ever since.

Next came a succession of dreary but respectable, secure jobs. I'm currently in the midst of a starving writer phase, the kind of phase that gives mothers everywhere fits of apoplexy. (In her defense, my Mom's been very supportive.) I work part-time at a job with no hope for career advancement and love it. My career now is writing.

On a typical day, I do some writing, some reading, some writing, and a lot more reading. Because they won't give me any peace until I do, I take the dogs for a walk. I spend a couple of hours working with my horse, who is convinced he's a dog. Sometimes, I play fiddle.

And some days...I just sit in the dirt and watch the bugs.