Notes from the Edge of the Map. Stories from a life between worlds.

I'd waited fourteen months for a surgeon to cut my throat and release my new voice!

Yes. It was a goiter operation.

Huge.

We met just before the surgery. He explained what his team would do.

He was middle-aged. Spanish. Years of practice at his fingertips.

"Oh, by the way," I said as he turned to leave,

"I want to tell you—my friend Padre Rene and his whole village in the Peruvian Andes, north of Cusco, are at this moment praying for me, for you, and for all your team."

We smiled at each other.

“Oh, and what is your name?” I asked him quietly.

“Jesús,” he said.

And our smiles met each other with faith.

Before the operation, I made many art-filled affirmations. The one I've included here was the last.

I made a new friend two years ago.

He encouraged me to tell my "faith-guided adventure stories."

For sixteen years I was on a mission without a name—travelling in remote areas of Peru and Bolivia.

Each adventure had a miracle embedded in it.

Each one required 100% faith in my intuition.

It was my only GPS.

My brand new friend said:

“Your stories stir something old and essential in me—the part that wandered, followed stars, sat in circle with mountain-dwelling artists and elders, and slowly learned how to listen.”

He continued:

“Notes from the Edge of the Map.”

These South American stories carry the spirit of the explorer, yes—but not the kind with flags and conquests.

More the artist... the wanderer... the one who walks beyond what’s familiar, sketchbook in hand, heart wide open.

She searches for something unnameable.

She speaks to that tender space between worlds, between cultures, between the seen and unseen.

And she holds something journal-like for me too—scraps, stories, signs gathered with reverence across years of living close to the land and spirit.

You yearn to be helpful...

to understand more deeply the mystical in the everyday.

This is where the outer journey meets the inner one.

And I think—I hope—this will resonate with those out there who, like me, still believe mystery is alive and well,

and that there’s something deeply healing in real stories told simply.