Your Creative Midlife

Why is Nantucket such a powerful setting for novels about renewal and reinvention? The island seems to be a place where life can change in the course of a summer, especially for those in midlife facing an empty nest or a change in a relationship.  

As author Nancy Thayer explains, Nantucket is for many people a magical place that changed her own life and now provides a setting where her characters can reset and start over.  Thayer h...

Charley Walters proves that you don’t have to create art to be immersed in it.  Over the 50 years he has lived on Nantucket, Charley has become a guiding presence in the island’s evolving arts scene.

In this episode, he recounts his early career writing album reviews for Rolling Stone magazine and the Boston Phoenix while owning Nantucket’s only record store.  As the music industry shifted, he leveraged his expertise to start a new ...

How many of you out there have dreams of forming a rock group with your pals playing the music you love? In this episode, members of the Nantucket-based Beatles cover band, Cranberry Alarm Clock, discuss their recent experience traveling to Liverpool to perform at the International Beatle Week Festival.

Band members Phil Proch, Tom Proch, Frankie Hunter, Skip Curtin share their origin story, how they came together as musicians in mi...

“What an interesting life you’ve led.  You should write a book.”  Has anyone ever told you that?  Or maybe you’ve thought this about your own life?   There are many reasons to write a memoir.  You may find it cathartic to “get it all out there” or maybe you have a life story that you think readers will find entertaining.  Either way, says memoirist and writing workshop leader Sarah Saffian, there is a difference between therapeutic...

Stella Fosse retired from her biotech career ten years ago and started writing.  Her work encompasses a surprising range, from blogs to novels to non-fiction guides for midlife women who want to write their own stories filled with love and romance.  Her new book is “Rock On: Power, Sex & Money After 60”.  As she says, “Nobody told me how great life after 60 could be.”  

This episode covers:

• How Stella began her writing journe...

Discovering your creative outlet can be beneficial on many levels.  Just ask John Kneapler, who found that painting helped him through the death of both parents.  Then the impact of COVID on his graphic design business led him to move into painting full-time. John describes the profound importance of finding a creative passion and a supportive community, which he discovered at the Art Students League in New York City. We talk about...

Summer can offer us time to contemplate the future and imagine life changes. If you are on Nantucket, you might consider consulting Suzanne Keating. She's an astrologer with a longstanding practice on the island.  With interest in astrology and tarot growing, it's a great time to learn more about this ancient practice.  Our talk also covered the historical roots of astrology and its connection to modern psychology through...

Sometimes the first step in your midlife creative journey is to look back at the things you loved as a kid. For Lela Goldstein, it was building on her love of paper, images, colors and patterns that led her to explore the world of collage. As she approached retirement, she discovered collage as an ideal creative outlet: with “just scissors and paper and glue and something to put your images on,” collage offers endless creative poss...

The popular Shanty Cruise offers a unique experience for visitors and locals alike—evoking the spirit of long-ago ship crews who sang these working songs as they hoisted sails and weighed anchor. For anyone exploring creative pursuits in midlife or retirement, it’s a reminder that it’s never too late to join in something joyful, musical, and community-driven.

Betsy’s conversation with the singers—both in studio and aboard the Minke—...

Lynn Savarese, a Harvard-trained lawyer, discovered her love of photography when she took a beginner's photography class at Manhattan’s 92nd Street Y. Soon after, she volunteered to photograph taxidermied birds at the American Natural History Museum, bringing her own materials and artistic viewpoint to the project. Lynn’s astonishing presentation of the birds led to her first solo exhibition, launching her photography career.

P...

Your Creative Midlife – Nantucket Edition

Your Creative Midlife is visiting Nantucket for special episodes this summer. Nantucket is a beautiful wedge of sand 30 miles off the coast of Cape Cod. Just 14 miles long and 7 miles wide, it has a storied human history—from early Indigenous people to English settlers to becoming one of the wealthiest towns in the mid-1800s at the height of the whaling industry. Today, it’s a place full of ...

Dan Moretti is a lawyer in New York City who is finding success as a playwright.  During COVID, Dan started writing one-act plays, which have since been produced by New York theater workshop groups with professional actors.  His plays draw inspiration from his own life experiences, including his background as a lawyer. Dan tells about the inspirations for his work, how his attorney training helps him structure his plays and how he ...

After a 33-year career as a pediatric dentist, Manhattan-based Dr. Deborah Pilla took on a challenge that rewards her love of art and of learning:  becoming a docent and a school programs guide at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Her work with children in her dental practice makes her a natural for engaging students during museum tours.  She also has her own arts practice, which she views as an important creative outlet.  She has ta...

They met in tap dancing class in NYC as young theater hopefuls.  Marriage, babies and a move to the suburbs followed.  But they never lost their love of theater.  Now, post retirement, they are finding their way back to the stage.  Kathleen Mahan is now a director and theater arts teacher working with both kids and adults.  And after years of involvement in local theater, Steve has re-entered the professional world.

Discussion inclu...

For anyone who regrets quitting their music lessons when they were little and assumes it’s too late to go back, please listen to Elena Rahona talk about founding the New York Late Starters Orchestra, modeled on a similar one in London.  “Late starters” are people who want to resume playing their childhood instruments, are learning a new instrument, or have never played before.  Late Starters ensembles emphasize coming together as a...

Extended Version of Episode 2

Graham Broyd thought he’d write down the stories of his adventures as a 20-year-old from the UK hitchhiking across the United States, stories he’d been telling friends for decades.  Through a series of improbable events, Forbes publishing discovered him, and the result is Graham’s forthcoming book, "Backpack Jacket Surfboard."

We talk about Graham’s experience working with the Forbes edito...

After many turns as a marketing and media entrepreneur, Cherie Corso turned her energy and talent to abstract painting, with great results. Just two years in, she’s exhibiting her canvases, making sales, and even donating a few to charities for auction. She shares her latest project, The Pulse of New York: she took canvases to all five boroughs, where people on the street would interact and leave their mark on them. Cherie models t...

Graham Broyd thought he’d write down the stories of his adventures as a 20-year-old from the UK hitchhiking across the United States, stories he’d been telling friends for decades.  Through a series of improbable events, Forbes publishing discovered him, and the result is Graham’s forthcoming book, "Backpack Jacket Surfboard."

We talk about Graham’s experience working with the Forbes editorial team, Graham also compar...