Lois Campbell lives in a small Oregon beach town with the love of her life—and of course her piano, the same piano that she bought when she was a child earning thirty-five cents an hour babysitting, pullings weeds, and selling greeting cards and burn salve.
She grew up in a working-class neighborhood in Portland, OR, committed to silence and hard work.
Birth:
Lois Campbell was born in Wadena, Minnesota in 1950. Her family moved to Portland, Oregon shortly after she was born.
Education:
Lois graduated from Roosevelt High School in 1968, and earned college credit at Portland Community College, Portland State College, and Marylhurst University —studying psychology, foreign language, business, and writing. Much of her knowledge has come from the school of hard knocks.
Work Experience:
She worked in retail sales for several years and was a telephone operator. Working from home after her children were born: she tied flies for fishing, manufactured and sold “Snow People” (her own design), and sold Jafra Cosmetics— becoming a manager. She did industrial sewing for a furniture manufacturer before she and her husband ran their own sales-repping business for office furniture for over thirty years.
Writing:
Lois is the author of the children’s book, Oddie the Cat-Faced Dog (Oddie Finds A Friend), a book that encourages children to embrace diversity. Writing by hand in pencil became therapeutic until—after over twenty years—a thousand pages evolved into her four book series: The Silent Piano. She also enjoys writing poetry.
Photography:
A two-year endeavor to create a photo gallery displaying one of her hobbies—photos of flowers—opened and crashed along with the economy in 2008.
Music:
She has studied the piano throughout her life. And in recent years, she composes her own music and writes her own songs. She enjoys singing with her husband in San Francisco and Carmel as often as they can at old fashioned piano bars.
Past:
The memory of her traumatic past whispers to her every now and then, but now the trauma quickly disappears, and she acknowledges how grateful she is for the life she lives.
Family:
Lois enjoys fleeting moments with her three adult children and their spouses, her five grandchildren, and four great-grandsons. She tends to her home and flowers, plays her piano, writes poetry, prose, and songs, and composes music.