I was born in Northern California and spent all of my childhood adjacent to Air Force Bases in the Western U.S. and Southeast Asia. I have a B.A. in English with a minor in Russian from the University of California at Davis, and a Master of Library and Information Studies from the University of California at Berkeley.
I began working as a Circulation Assistant at Gleeson Library in 1991, worked as a librarian at the San Francisco Public Library, and finally joined the Reference department at Gleeson in 1998 with a focus on reference technology. I began as Head of Reference and Research Services in 2011, and became Head of Reference & Access Services in 2021
I'm interested in the writer Joyce Carol Oates and maintain both a comprehensive web site and a scholarly journal on the topic. I enjoy running and hiking, photography, gadgets, and various genres of music including a current enjoyable exploration of heavy music styles. I support open inquiry, viewpoint diversity, and constructive disagreement in research and education, and am a lifelong believer in the possibilities of nonviolence exemplified by the progression of thought and action from Tolstoy, to Gandhi, to King.