In 2013, my mother died. No one knew she was dying. We all thought mom was just recovering from back surgery. I was in the hospital with her - incessantly and annoyingly on my cell phone, making preparations for the production of the play,

A Picasso, by Jeffrey Hatcher, to be performed in the South of France and even­tually in Paris and Los Angeles.

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I remember my mother telling one of the nurses in her heavy Latin-accented English, "Ah my daughter always searching for more, nothing good enough for her. Now she goes to do play in France. In French. Hollywood- not enough".

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For the next four years, I went on to direct and act in A Picasso, in English and French. The journey was exhilarating and playing Mademoiselle Fischer, the Nazi Cultural Attaché, brought in to in­ terrogate and destroy Pablo Picasso in Occupied Paris - was every night- emotionally shattering.

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In the pre-production phase of the Parisian production, I met  a man who whiplashed my life into a stunning love affair that took us from Paris, to San Francisco, to Malibu, to Las Vegas, to Santa Barbara, to New York, and back, and back again.

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Together we created the journey that I call, A Year in Picasso. In this time period, I wrote the poetry that you find in the book, A Moment in Time. The poetry was never meant as an artistic en­ deavor - it just flowed out of me as I was in a constant state of angst and turmoil. I was living two lives - « Mademoiselle Fischer's » and mine. Mademoiselle Fischer had Hatcher's text to express how she felt. The poetry was the incessant monologue purging itself from my heart.

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When the love affair was over - so was the poetry from that moment in time. I didn't do anything with the poems.

They just sat in the confines of my computer. Then, one day, I began writ­ing the screenplay, A Year in Picasso. Much like the poetry it just flowed out of me and I remembered the poems. I used excerpts from the poems as a device to tie into the emotional through line of the main character. Life becomes Art?

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My fiance, Tom, made fun of me and called me Trumbo, referencing the 1940's screenwriter, Dalton Trumbo, who used elaborate cards and diagrams to create his scripts. Tom witnessed my outlines and diagrams; more importantly, how I inserted ex­cerpts from Hatcher's A Picasso, into my screenplay.

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When I was finally done with the 165-page manuscript - he walked by the printer and began to read. He pointed to one of the poetry excerpts and said, "What is this?" - "Oh, just some poetry", I replied, dismissively. When he was done reading the screen­ play, A Year in Picasso, he asked me if he could have a copy of all the poems. I hesitated - as they were poems inspired by another man.

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Reluctantly, months later, I printed them all out and gave them to him - so he wouldn't think I was hiding anything. When he was done - he said, "Your poems moved me and made me cry. I think they tell a story and they should be in a book."