Photo: Jon Gardiner/UNC-Chapel Hill

It’s been a while. More than a while. Eons, really, in web life, since I’ve posted. How does a wordsmith not write? Isn’t writing like breathing for a journo? Indeed it is. And I have, actually, been writing. However, in a dramatically different format.

A little explanation is clearly needed:

Since moving to Chapel Hill, North Carolina, I wrote for several local publications and continued to freelance for national ones. I had also been working on two books. Yet I was feeling unfulfilled. After all my years in the entertainment industry, I found myself itching for an alternative that would inspire me creatively and intellectually. Then, one day as I contemplated this while stopped at a red light on Columbia Street, I glanced to my right. The brick and beige buildings of The University of Chapel Hill beckoned and I felt an immediate connection. Academia! Higher education! Forward-thinking, educated peers with whom I can exchange vigorous dialogue! I raced home and began investigating job postings at UNC.

Discovering that the UNC LGBTQ Center was looking for someone who could write their newsletter and create an alumni publication, I immediately applied. Once the Director learned of my skills, I found myself a member of the Tar Heel family. For over three years, I helped support LGBTQ visibility as webmaster of our site, social media, printed flyers, a weekly newsletter and the Alumni publication. Stuck on what to call the latter (alumni is a male gendered reference and we wanted to be inclusive, but unique), I held a well-publicized contest for alumni to come up with the title. The winner got a basket of goodies donated by GAA, Carolina’s alumni association, plus bragging rights. The winning title was “Aluminate,” a clever convergence of “alumni” and “illuminate.” I quickly learned InDesign and found myself in writer’s heaven as I created, wrote, edited, designed and distributing the publication.

The small but effective team at the LGBTQ Center lived by the motto “Teamwork makes the dream work,” collaborating on numerous trainings, programs and initiatives for faculty, staff, students and Carolina community members. We worked hard, but laughed a lot. We joked that, in most offices, it is inappropriate to discuss sex, politics or religion, yet our purpose demanded that those topics were the focus of our conversations. As an ally, I felt empathy and compassion for our constituents. The troubling stories of students terrified of being homeless if their parents learned about their sexuality were something that I lost countless nights of sleep over. After working so many years in the entertainment industry, doing work that was socially relevant and literally saved lives was incredibly fulfilling. But with my skillset, I quickly outgrew the position and there was no room in the budgetarily constrained office for me to grow. It was time to look elsewhere.

Just around that time, I participated in a Diversity Training, held by a brilliant woman named Sharbari Dey, who worked in the University’s office of Diversity and Multicultural Affairs. This aligned with my social leanings and growing awareness. I wanted to be involved in this work. It would allow me to continue to support the work of the LGBTQ Center and other affinity centers across campus. In the meantime, I reached out to Sharbari to offer my skills if they were needed. Luck shined upon me when the Communications Specialist in Diversity and Multicultural Affairs announced her retirement. There is an expression in Hebrew called b’shert, or “meant to be.” It clearly was b’shert – my destiny – to land in this department. In November 2015, I took over the vacated position and have since been working tirelessly towards creating a Carolina that is inclusive for ALL.

The breadth of written coverage in this department – now known as the University Office for Diversity & Inclusion -  is like no other: rather than focus just on our programs and initiatives, my purpose is to amplify messaging from every other department/unit/school across Carolina that has to do with diversity, equity and inclusion. Features covered the spectrum of diversity, equity and inclusion issues. I write Diversity Spotlights about faculty, staff and students who have worked towards advancing diversity at UNC and beyond; features about my colleagues who have achieved success; memorial pieces about faculty who have died, especially those from minority groups who have achieved awareness of American Indian and other heritages; coverage of COVID-19′s impact on different populations, and more.

So, you see, I’ve been a busy little wordsmith. Telling the stories of people who have been invisible, othered, and micro-aggressed upon. It is incredibly rewarding to contribute to a better of understanding of each other through my writing. My hope is that my efforts help our society return to a positive trajectory towards empathy, acceptance and unity. It’s b’shert.

In spite of living in close proximity to the “city that never sleeps,” I rarely had a chance to partake of its bounty of cultural offerings.  In Westchester, where I lived, property taxes were the highest in the country (my bill was an exorbitant $21,000 a year and climbing) and every potential outing to the city was measured against the cost differential of such an undertaking.  An evening out?  $75 for the babysitter, $10 for tolls, $20 for parking, $100 for dinner…that’s over $200 for a couple of hours of sushi sans sake.  It became less time-consuming and more economically prudent to prepare a meal at home and dig in for the night.

Another Frigid NYC Winter

True, museums were relatively inexpensive, but theater was crazy expensive.  And the financial squeeze wasn’t the only issue.  It was so brutally cold during the blizzard-filled winter of 2010/2011, we actually built a full-size igloo in our front yard.  And the plummeting temperatures were such that we were able to sustain our domed ice house for nearly two months.  The thought of facing another blisteringly frigid season was enough to send me over the edge, so when we visited Chapel Hill over spring break, I was ripe to fall in love with the place.  It is a community of educated and warm people, abundant restaurants, rich culture (rife with museums and performing arts houses), manageable cost of living and thrillingly mild climate.

Dining Al Fresco

Once I made the move, the folks at Chapel Hill magazine learned of my work at Westchester magazine – a similarly high-end publication focused on an upscale readership – and asked me to contribute to their pages.  One of the earliest pieces I did for them was a spread about an outdoor kitchen designed for a family that enjoyed entertaining al fresco.  The owners were two married doctors with great, upbeat senses of humor and an eagerness to share their excitement about their home improvement.  When I commented on how much I loved the neighborhood, they urged me to talk to some neighbors who were about to put their home on the market.  This is just the sort of friendliness I enjoyed in my new community.  Chapel Hill, where the soil is rich and ideal for transplanting Yanks in need of sun.

Write On!

I write.

I write because I must, because I can’t imagine not expressing myself in a language that finds its rhythmic peaks and valleys depending on its particular audience and format.  Words are the magic with which I weave my message.  And the tapestry upon which they take their shape is a varied one.  I pen screenplays, books, business proposals, advertising copy, magazine profiles and pieces, radio scripts, biographies and more!

And because I am so profuse with my verbiage (using strong editing skills as well), it seems only logical that I provide an outlet for others to view my work.  So here, for your reading pleasure, is my official site.  Enjoy!

Adrianne

Words, Words, Words!

The words come from the mind, transmitted from the brain in a series of cerebral orders that travel through the neurons until the fingers respond.  They move across a keyboard or clutch a pen (or quill or crayon) as they insert the words onto a page.  And then, Voila!  There is the message!  Just a series of neurotransmissions…but it all starts with a fertile imagination and the willingness – Nay, Eagerness! – to share. In fact, it is a profound desire to create images and messages with words that propels the writer.

Topics are infinite and depend on the mood, interest or assignment of the author. There are times when one is so inspired, the urge to reach for the nearest scrap of paper and writing utensil becomes almost unbearable. More than once, I was grateful for the shorthand class I took in my senior year of high school so I could capture my thoughts at their most vibrant (although taking shorthand notes as a film reviewer while sitting in a darkened theater often took the equivalent of a Rosetta stone to translate later).

Even so, in our excitement, we rush to get our thoughts down on paper (or disk), feeling a sense of relief when they’ve been properly recorded…but one must then step away from the work and digest. The words are like a great meal that must marinate.  Publish in haste and you may regret the uncooked version.  But allow some time for the flavor to sink in, for rumination to offer alternative words or passages, and you may wind up with Cordon Bleu-calibre literature!