My name is Jacqueline Nicole Dymphna Mears. Or Jack. As a little girl I liked to wear my hair in two braids and always felt a kind of sadness when adults would tell me that someday I would have to grow up and stop wearing my hair that way. (To this day I still do not understand what two braids has to do with being an adult and why adults cannot wear that style.)

Reaching the age of proper adulthood it dawned on me one day that everything I'd been told as a child, wasn't all that bad. For one, an adult can wear her hair in two braids. For another, when you are an adult, there is no longer anyone who can tell you to stop jumping in every body of water you see no matter what the weather is. (Sure, they can try, but there is no longer that obedience rule in place. If they don't want to get wet, stay out of the splash range of the puddle.)

I have learned much in my thirty and so years of life - my life which did not fall apart after I turned twenty-five, which was another urban legend I was told growing up which is up there with the one that I'd grow out of my love of dinosaurs. I now live on my own in Nevada, where I work as a nanny so I can pay rent on my apartment. I attend college, working to get my master's degree in Anthropology so I can become an Archaeologist. 

I adult very well in fact.

Except, as mentioned, I cannot resist jumping in puddles, even in the dead of winter. My neighbors seem to view me as some ill placed pioneer girl who is always baking something or canning something, or sewing her own clothes. Any time I can ditch my shoes I do so, because nothing is more pleasing than frolicking through a forest barefoot and wearing a ranger cloak.

I have mastered the art of reading and walking, though not walking by itself. I have perfected clumsiness to the point I walk into doors and doorways. I laugh hysterically at my own jokes, and aside from my own humor I only seem to appreciate puns, dad jokes, and WWII jokes. 

I write. A lot. To the point I consider myself an author. I also throw daggers and boots at the characters in my books, because they deserve it.

I craft like it is going out of style.

If there is an outdoor activity you can most likely find me doing it.

I take fencing lessons, because nothing gives one the feeling of power like wielding a sword. I also do archery - and given the fact I like honey in my coffee, it is no secret I am a ranger.

I fly planes, ride a motorcycle, and if I am ever forced to survive in the woods for a year I am prepared. I am a tomboy, who is most comfortable in flowy skirts and daggers in my boots.

I have been adopted by a large Italian family who are just as weird as I am and has never once made me feel like some kind of creature from the black lagoon for my love of history and my ability to contain odd and pointless facts. 

I have begun to discover that it is okay to be a lot different, and there is never a need to feel like one should give up likes and interests because they are "childish".