About The Author

I’m nobody famous (yet).
I’ve not done anything all that spectacular in my life (yet).
Truth be told I could be anyone already in your world.  We might pass each other in traffic every day if you happen to live in Fairfax County in Northern Virginia between February 2007 and December 2008.  I might be the person who held up the “Scan Your Own Groceries” line at the grocery store the other day because I just had to buy mostly produce.  It’s possible that I’m the “fellow shopper” you stopped in the Health & Beauty aisle at Target last Tuesday to ask where the blow dryers were.  (I get that a lot – I must look like I work in every retail store in America!  I digress . . .)
The point is I’m really not anybody all that remarkable.  So, I hear you asking: “Why am I standing here reading your book and why spend the money on it?” 
Because something in the title or about the cover grabbed you.
Because while you may not know exactly what, you know something resonated with you.

In all likelihood I’m not going to say anything here that hasn’t been said a thousand times before, and it’s probably something you’ve heard at least a hundred of those times.  The words themselves won’t be all that different.  The difference will be the voice with which I say them and how that connects with you in a way that all the others didn’t.  You’ve come this far, go ahead to the check out, take me and my words home with you, curl up with a cup of coffee or a glass of wine or whatever your favorite reading beverage is and let’s see what happens with all those ripples that happen after the pebbles hit the ponds of our lives.
Just watch out for the short brunette in the “Check Your Own Groceries” aisle with all the produce if you’re at Wal-Mart or the grocery store.  You never know how long she’ll take . . .

Since we’re going to be spending time together you and me I’ll tell you a little bit about myself:
I’m forty three years old as of February 21st, 2008.
I’ve been unsuccessfully married three times.
I have one child – a son who will be 19 in December of this year (2008).
I’m finally marrying the right man for the right reasons in June of 2009.
I have a bachelor’s degree in a field I’ve never really worked in.
I’ve been an Administrative/Executive Assistant just about all of my professional life and I actually enjoy doing that.
My parents are still married after 46 years (in 2008).
I’m the older of two daughters (by three years).
I have two nieces who I adore.
I’ve been a room mother, a Mary Kay Consultant, and briefly toyed with the idea of selling both Tupperware and Avon at different points in my life.
I drive a Ford Escape (2008).
My father served twenty years in The United States Air Force and my  mother was a “housewife” (that’s what they were called “in the day”) until I was about ten and she went to work full-time.
I’ve had the following as pets: dogs, cats, fish (mostly Guppies), a mouse, and a rabbit that didn’t last very long.
I’m terrified of heights, snakes, rats, and the dark.
In short:  I’m about as average, every day, all American as they come.

I’ve made my fair share of wrong decisions for the right reasons and a few right decisions for the wrong reasons.
I’m far from perfect.
I’m not a guru, an expert, a saint, or a sage.
I’m simply a woman who has lived her life and learned a lot of lessons along the way and that’s why all those people kept telling me “You should write a book Julianne” and that’s what you have in your hands right now.
That’s “About The Author” for now – there will be more later.

What “About The Title”?  Why “Where The Pebble Hits The Pond”?
Before I started this venture I’d e-mailed Jenny, one of my oldest and dearest friends, an image of the cover to get her reaction.  She came back with “It has good symbolism” so I asked her what symbolism she saw in it.  Her reply:
One could interpret it to mean the event that signifies the beginning of one’s life and how it causes ripples to cross and interact with other lives.  Or, one could assume it means “origin of” or “the cause of”—why you are the way you are (the ripples) which originate and are caused by the object that hit the pond (a parent perhaps).  Or the pebble is reflective of a significant action you’ve taken that sets rings of events into motion.  It’s really endless.  But it always comes back to me as being the beginning of something-- an event or person that set the whole thing in motion-- with subsequent consequences.
My first thought was “Maybe she should write this book!”  Instead I ended up asking her to put her artistic self ‘out there’ for me and asked her to re-draw the image I’d ‘borrowed’ for the cover design idea I’d sent her and what caught your eye was what she came up with.
But before I did all that I replied to her reply with this:
It's all of that!
It's also the idea that we live our lives right there where the pebble hits the pond - at the epicenter of the ripples.  We can't really control the ripples and we can't stop other people's ripples from bumping into us.  All we can deal with at any given moment is where we are when the pebble hits and go from there.

And that’s a lot of what you’ll find in these pages.
Ideas – some of them lessons I’ve learned from personal experience, some of them things I’ve learned from other people (who are duly credited), and a lot of references to people whose words and writings have not just influenced but changed my life’s perspectives – for what to do when we find ourselves in those moments with the pebbles hitting and the ripples rippling that might just help keep things in perspective and our heads above water!  (See what I meant about the run-on sentences?)