About Confronting Power and Chaos: the Uncharted Kaleidoscope of My Life:
~~~ “That one event, that one ten-minute car ride, radically bowled over my life’s kaleidoscope.”
What’s in a name?
Her trailblazer of a distant cousin forged a solitary, singular path during and after WWII. Unassuming and somewhat clueless, Christine eventually finds she has to do pretty much the same. A teen fully expecting her Midwestern life would be drab and ho-hum, she meets in Germany an elderly man who offered her a ride – and insight into a legacy she was going to rely on throughout her entire life.
Marrying the wrong guy, divorced, isolated, and responsible for four chronically ill children, she charged forward, brooking no fools to get her children the healthcare and education they richly deserved, even if that meant blackmailing the governor of Iowa. She took on the powers that be (including spooks invading her home for six months), while always striving for the career she pined for.
Throughout all the decades of financial and personal setbacks and the chaos that swirled around her, Christine’s legacy constantly beckoned her: to be worthy of that distant cousin, WWII’s most decorated courier, and of a timeless love story she witnessed.
Christine’s life journey, including her 12 years in Poland (her other homeland), is a stirring testament to determination, imagination, and the power of perseverance and of thinking out of the box.
~~~synopsis~~~
Confronting Power & Chaos: the Uncharted Kaleidoscope of My Life details how the impact of learning about my namesake and predecessor guided me through five decades of chaos. As a divorced, single parent, I had to deal with four chronically ill children, one of whom (my eldest daughter) developed the hormonal imbalance known as Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. I had to appeal to her as the woman of grace I saw her as, as she dealt with bulimia and anorexia and so many suicidal thoughts/attempts as a teen and young adult.
Once I got all four of my children through college, the Great Recession hit, and I lost my last American job and home. Because I had researched my predecessor’s life and interviewed her remaining WWII associates, my subsequent biopic screenplay led me to Poland, our ancestral homeland. There I was finally allowed to follow my once chosen career as an editor.
This book exposes all the power plays that were thrown at me and I had to overcome with the help of men who – for whatever reason – saw bits of my predecessor in me.
