Hi,
I'm a wife, a mother, a grandmother, a musician, a writer, a poet and my house is a mess. (It was a mess before the "Federal Flood" but its worse now.)
I'm 5'7" and weigh 150+ lbs, I'm old enough to know better but too young to resist. I live in New Orleans so you know I'm crazy.

I still have the same husband I started with which is some kind of a miracle because we are both spoiled brats, but we love each other.

We have four kids, all grown and no, I repeat NO pets. When the kids were little, we had the requisite dogs and cats and hamsters and they are all gone now and we have fond memories but no fleas, no chewed up furniture and shoes, no strange barf, no vet bills and we can take off with our band for two weeks without hiring a pet sitter or paying kennel costs.

We don't get to see our grandsons enough because they live with our daughter, AD, in LA, la la land; where earth quakes hit with no warning. At least, in Louisiana we know when a hurricane is coming. AD is a marvelous designer, but she works as a real estate salesone for a mortgage guarantee company.

People ask why folks don't leave when a hurricane comes. Because you never really know which way it will go. We went up river to say with friends in Bogalusa to escape Georges and it followed us up the river and tore up trees and power lines and we couldn't get home for a week.
It didn't even rain back in New Orleans in our backyard. One never knows do one?

My husband is a musician, a poet and writer plus he is an very good artist and luckily, loves to sweep and scrub floors. I sometimes sew and every so often, clean house (spring cleaning and fall cleaning aren't enough?), but I keep the bathroom and the kitchen as clean as can be.

We perform with each other as David and Roselyn and we also perform with Mo'Lasses, New Orleans' (mostly) Women's Brass Band. Mo'Lasses has a CD out called "Live at the Columns Hotel, New Orleans". David and I have a half dozen CD's out which can be found on our website DavidandRoselyn.com. We have performed almost all over the world. The fartherest we have been is Melbourne, Australia. We were in Finland last summer and Japan in February.

My ideal job would be to perform on an around the world cruise ship until I had visited every country reachable by boat. We would perform one or two shows per night on board and when we were off duty, I would have time to finish one of the dozen or so books I have started to write.

Our daughter, Arlee Leonard is a world traveling jazz singer and she's probably been to more countries than we have. She writes music and poetry and has a CD out called "Wild Honey". She is beginning to write her biography.

Our daughter, Autumn is in grad school studying film development and has made several films, a couple of which I am in. She writes scripts. She got married last Labor day and you can see her wedding (the greatest wedding ever)on AutumnandJustin.com

To fill in time and make more money I work in movies as an extra or preferably in featured roles and/or as a musician. I am working as an extra in "Cirque du Freak" and featured as a grandmother in "Forget Me Not" both of which are still in production. The most famous movie I have been in is "Angel Heart" directed by Alan Parker and starring Robert DiNero and Lisa Bonet. My name is in the credits longer than my face is on the screen, but you hear me singing all through the scene where Ms Bonet offs the chicken.

Our son, Stormy, is also an artist, poet and musician, but unlike the rest of the family, he is nuts so he'll probably be the big star!

See you in the movies.

My passion is ...

my family and music

I know too much about ...

politics

My parents always told me ...

You can be anything you want if you are willing to work for it.

My childhood ambition ...

To be a lawyer

My favorite memory ...

My very first memory I was less than two. I am sure of that because my parents were divorced by the time I was two and this was when we still lived in the little house on Kenilworth in Flint, Michigan. It was a very small house, painted blue on the outside. We were in the kitchen and I was seated in hot water in the porcelain kitchen sink. It was a big sink, the kind with porcelain drain boards on both sides. My mother, Ailene, was so young and pretty it hurt to look at her.

Why I write ...

Because I can

What I am reading/watching/listening to ...

A letter I wrote which was printed in Thursday, May 15, '08 USA TODAY, I watched "Young At Heart" which is great and I am listening to John Boutte's CD "Jumbalaya"

My first job ...

Baby sitting when I was eleven for two boys aged 10 and 12.

My best moment ...

Winning on the Gong Show

My inspiration ...

My marvelous mother, Ailene Roselyn Butler.

Politics, News & Issues > Pulitzer Center What role should the US play in reducing the production of illicit drugs-such as cocaine and heroin-in places like Bolivia and Afghanistan?

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WHAT ROLE SHOULD THE US PLAY IN REDUCING THE PRODUCTION OF ILLICIT DRUGS-SUCH AS COCAINE AND HEROIN-IN PLACES LIKE BOLIVIA AND AFGHANISTAN?

NONE! We would be much better off reducing the production of tobacco in the United states. That drug kills over five hundred thousand (500,000) users yearly. Cocaine and Heroin together kill less than ten thousand (10,000) users per year.

However, we could kill two birds with one stone, or eliminate two problems with one solution. We eliminate the Taliban AND the terrorists in Afghanistan by buying up all the poppies Afghan farmers grow, proce...

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