Annie (Thompson) Estlund was born and reared in Wisconsin, and spent most of her life there until 1994, except for a two-year stint at Cottey College for Women in Nevada, MO in the 1950s.
The writing bug bit Annie in 1956, when she and her new husband, Bruce, owned and were co-editors of a tiny weekly newspaper, The Muscoda Progressive, in southwestern Wisconsin.
As a co-editor, Annie was privileged to write important news articles, a humorous weekly column and miles of local "items," AND sell advertising, keep up the subscription list, hand-set type for job printing, run the addressograph, run the job press, pitch in with the huge press and folder when necessary, and clean the office occasionally, AND keep the apartment and family in some kind of order at home. Bruce's load was heavy, too.
The two always knew that someday they would look back on this experience with fond memories. (It took more than 25 years.) With little Cindy looking on from her playpen, and her brother, David, trying to kick his way out of Annie's tummy, they decided the daily regimen of a small weekly newspaper was a whole lot more stressful than satisfying at that time.
A & B and their two, woops make that three, little ones, C, D and E (for Eric), moved on to bigger Wisconsin towns and bigger jobs for Daddy, while Mommy stayed home and ran the house and family. Annie continued her writing, when time allowed, for magazines, newspapers and newsletters, gradually honing her craft.
At the age of 29, Annie began planning
a self-help book for widows with her recently widowed best friend, Pauli, also 29. The two had become lifelong friends while attending Cottey College. In spite of their enthusiasm, that project soon became a struggle...with Annie living in Waukesha, a Milwaukee suburb, and Pauli living in Minneapolis. It died on the vine as each succumbed to the time required to care for three babies and maintain a home.
Annie finally received her degree in journalism, from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, at the age of 45, shortly after her youngest departed the nest for college. She had co-authored a book about working mothers that was "almost published" in the '70s, and she wrote 4 (mediocre) romance novels in the '80s, just for fun. But mostly she wrote for (much bigger) newspapers, and for regional and national magazines.
After a stint as Public Relations Writer for the Milwaukee Art Museum, Annie worked as the editor of several area newsletters. In 1986 she and Bruce retired to write full time, and soon moved to their little log cottage on the rocky shores of Lake Michigan in beautiful Door County, Wisconsin.
Then "IT" happened to her. At age 55 Annie was suddenly widowed. She was completely thrown, and quickly realized that her "study of widowhood" years earlier was of little help to her now. She learned the hard way that only a widow can understand the harsh realities of widowhood well enough to comfort another widow. And she knew in her bones that she was going to write a book for widows.
She quickly began keeping an intimate journal of her turmoil and grief, and soon began designing what she still considers the perfect book to help herself and other widows deal with the agony and challenges of widowhood. For Widows Only! is that book. It became available in early 2004.
Annie and her new man, Bob, now make their home in Paradise, known to some as Ft. Myers, Florida. Their second home is "Dutch Treat," a roomy forty-foot Island Trader motorsailer, which usually can be found in and around the waters of Ft. Myers.
Bob and Annie spent the summers of 2002 and 2003 doing the 5,340 mile "Great Circle Loop," which took them up the U. S. east coast, mostly on the Intracoastal Waterway, to Chesapeake Bay, where they lingered and visited with Annie's kids a bit. Then, around New Jersey and up the Hudson River to New York's Erie Canal, where they left Dutch Treat high and dry for the winter.
After a long winter's rest, they picked her up and headed north, across Lake Ontario and through Canada's lovely Trent-Severn Waterway, not as lovely (to us) Georgian Bay and spectacular North Channel. Then it suddenly was time to head south, back into the U.S., under the Mackinac Bridge, down the picturesque Michigan shoreline and across the top of Indiana into Chicago's Sag Canal. This was their entry into the country's variable inland river system that slowly took them to the Gulf of Mexico and back to Ft. Myers.*
Dutch Treat is recuperating in the canal behind their home, (Anybody wanna buy a boat?) while Annie and Bob readjust to life inside their (much less confining) home on dry land.**
About Annie