Hi, my name is Beth. I’m 23 years old, and I’m originally from a suburb of Baltimore, Maryland. I’ve lived in Maryland all my life, haven’t really traveled much although I’d like to, and right now I’m living in Silver Spring, MD which is not far from Washington, DC. I’m a very recent graduate of the University of Maryland with a B.S. in Electrical Engineering. I guess like Lou in TYR, I chose an area that is still most definitely male-dominated.

I am currently in my fourth month of ‘real work’ as an electrical engineer for a company that specializes in satellite communications which I know close to nothing about. I think the only way I manage to get through work each day is by using every spare moment to check for TYR fan fiction updates and, more recently, by writing stories of my own. Since a lot of what I do requires using a computer, it looks like I'm actually doing work when I'm really just slacking off! Ain't it great! To get back and forth from work, I get the pleasure of sitting twice a day, every week day, in jammed traffic for about 50 minutes each time, and spending at least equal amounts of time complaining about it to anyone else who will listen to me (which is what you all are doing right now! Ha ha!). I can now say that I’m a contributing factor in the nation’s second worst gridlock problem (behind Los Angeles) as I traverse the Capitol Beltway. Woohoo!

Outside of work, I love to listen to music. I have a massive CD collection, particularly of classic rock from the 60s and 70s. Some of my favorite musical artists are The Beatles, Doors, Rolling Stones, Hendrix, Pink Floyd, Neil Young, The Who and other people who are either dead or should be. (I'm just kidding…it's just that my boyfriend complains that the people's music I listen to are either dead or really old and shouldn't be out there performing concerts, like The Rolling Stones, for instance. He especially teases me because of my obsession with U2--I've practically worn out my video of Rattle and Hum.) I also like some more modern artists from the 80s and 90s like Sarah McLachlan, Sting/The Police, Morrissey, Billy Joel, Depeche Mode. I love to sing along with these and other artists, especially when I'm stuck in traffic. Good thing I don't carpool! J

I am also a movie buff and have a huge video collection. Most of these movies I've taped and never actually gotten around to watching. I love lying on the couch, wrapped in a blanket, being lazy and doing nothing except watching these movies. If only I could get paid doing it. Maybe I should be movie critic or something.

Anyway, I’ve always loved writing although until lately, I hadn’t had much time to write anything substantial. In college, I was so caught up in trying to finish my engineering and other technical classes that I didn’t take the opportunity to expand my writing skills with the appropriate classes. Plus I didn’t have much free time to do fun writing. So, now that I’m graduated, I hope to get back the creativity that I think was hibernating for a long time. (I used to paint and write poetry and do all that artsy fartsy stuff—so why is it that now I’m an engineer? I find that I am asking myself that a lot lately…)

As for The Young Riders, I’ve been a fan ever since I happened upon it during the middle of the very first episode. I faithfully watched it every week from then on, and started taping it 5 episodes later when "Bad Blood" was aired. I don’t know if anyone else happens to remember this, but the week after that episode was first shown, it was supposed to the Baseball World Series, which would have bumped TYR off the air. Well, there was that big earthquake in San Francisco and the World Series was postponed, and the only good thing that I thought that came out if it was that the TV network re-aired the debut episode, "The Kid". Okay, I know there’s nothing good about an earthquake, but at the time I was just happy to get to see the entire first episode. (All you out there in California don’t kill me, please! I’d better just shut up…) I think my point was that I’ve been a devoted fan throughout the three-season run. J

I think it was last year when I first came across some of TYR fan pages. After not watching the episodes I’d taped for a few years, I started re-watching them after I graduated, falling in love with the show and the characters once again. And since I graduated, I’ve had much more time to check these web pages and read all the great fan fiction that’s out there. I guess I got so inspired by all the terrific stories that I decided to dig up the writer in myself and give it a try too.

I’ve completed six stories that are on various Young Rider pages, four are short, two are longer. My first allowed me to explore my love for the Jimmy and Lou romance in A Soul Tormented posted at St. James Place. The second was a more humorous bit called Luck of the Draw at Joanna’s Way Station. The third is my entry in Kirsten’s writing contest about how Jimmy became a Young Rider, A Step in the Right Direction. My last short one, which I actually wrote second but submitted last, is another Jimmy/Lou story called Dances and Dreams which is also at St. James Place. All of these stories, with the exception of my writing contest entry, were written with the intention of simply leading into a longer story involving more adventure and conflict. But I never seemed to get that far, so they became their own little stories. In the last few weeks, things have gotten better with my fan fiction attempts. So, I’m very excited to have finished writing a rather lengthy, more exciting Young Rider adventure story where I have included all the riders (some are more central than others though) plus some new characters. It’s called Eye of the Storm and is being posted in segments here at Kirsten’s Saddlin’ Station. My most recent piece is a called The Substitute Suitor, which is a short romantic-comedy focusing on Cody. It's being posted at Joanna's Way Station. Right now I'm slowly working on a new story that takes place after the end of the Express and Civil War. J

Finally, I’d like to thank everyone out there in Young Rider Land who has read my stories and given me the encouragement to continue. Thanks Mette, Wendie, Lyn, Ann, Kimberly and Sarah for the words of encouragement. Thanks to all the absolutely wonderful fan fic writers for giving me hour upon hour of reading pleasure and also inspiration for my own writing. I know I'm not always good about giving feedback to all the writers whose stories I've read, which would be all of them, it's just that I'd be emailing like a mad woman! I’d especially like to thank Kirsten, Tanya, and Joanna for allowing me to post my writing and giving me the positive feedback that I need.

I’ve taken up too much space already…That’s another problem of mine, I feel like the Energizer Bunny when it comes to writing in this stream-of-consciousness way, I keep going and going and going…It’s funny, ‘cause I’m not much of a talker, but when it comes to ‘talking’ via computer, my hands and the keyboard become like one… But I guess it’s turning into a good thing seeing as how my fan fiction is beginning to flow more freely! J Thanks again everyone! I like email, too, so if you ever feel so inclined, please drop me a line!

Beth would love to hear from you!E-mail!:)

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