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This site contains writings and other information by and about Abbie Johnson Taylor
Abbie Johnson Taylor's Autobiography
I was born in New York City on June 1, 1961 to Edwin Lee Johnson and Frances Joan Hinkley Johnson. After about a year, we moved to Boulder, Colorado where we lived for several years. When I was about four years old, we moved to Tucson, Arizona where we lived for about eight years. During that time, I attended the state school for the Blind and was then mainstreamed into a public school. In 1973, we moved to Sheridan, Wyoming, where my family has lived ever since, and I continued to attend public schools.
After graduating from Sheridan High School in 1980, I went to Sheridan College for two years and received an AA degree in music. I then transferred to Rocky Mountain College in Billings, Montana, where I received a BA in music two and a half years later. After that, I studied music therapy at Montana State University in Billings for two years, but I received no degree. I then completed a six-month internship at a nursing home in Fargo, North Dakota and returned to Sheridan in 1988.
About six months later, I started working as an activities assistant at a nursing home. I worked there for fifteen years. During that time, I also volunteered at other facilities that serve senior citizens in the Sheridan area. I facilitated a support group for the visually impaired, taught Braille, and served on the advisory board to a trust fund that allows visually impaired people and the agencies that serve them to purchase adaptive equipment and services. I also joined the YMCA where I take water exercise classes three days a week and a women's barber-shop singing group called Patchwork. I still enjoy these activities, but I quit my job and other volunteer obligations so I could write full time.
My work has appeared in various journals and anthologies including Emerging Voices, Wyoming Fence Lines, Voicings from the High Country, and The Braille Forum. A romance novel, We Shall Overcome, was published in July of 2007 by iUniverse. I am working on a second novel and a book of poems.
My mother passed away in 1999, but my father and an uncle and aunt live here in Sheridan. I have a younger brother, Andrew, who lives with his family in Palm Beach, Florida. Other relatives live in Colorado, California, and Utah.
I was married to Bill Taylor of Fowler, Colorado on September 10th, 2005. We have made our home here in Sheridan, where we hope to spend many happy years.
Thank you for visiting my site. I hope you enjoy reading some of my work. For more information about me and my husband plus more of my work, please click on the link that says, "Abbie’s Personal Page."
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