Midlife Makeover Show features Francine Falk Allen on today’s show

Wendy Valentine: M welcome to the Midlife Makeover Show. I’m your host, Wendy Valentine. And today we have an incredible guest who embodies resilience, reinvention and living life to the fullest. Francine Falk Allen. Francine is an award winning author, advocate and all around powerhouse who has spent her life navigating the world with a disability after contracting polio in 1951. Despite the challenges, she has embraced every twist and turn with creativity, courage and a, keep looking out the window philosophy. Always finding new ways to grow, explore and thrive. From running her own business for over 30 years to becoming an acclaimed author with three books under her belt, including no Spring Chicken, A Witty and Wise Guide to Aging and Adapting with Grace, Francine is proof that reinvention is always possible. Today we’ll dive into how to, how to embrace change, find new passions when life throws curveballs, and we know it always does, and continue living boldly at any age.

Francine was three years old when she contracted polio

So without further ado, please welcome Francine to the show.

Francine Falk-Allen: Thank you Wendy.

Wendy Valentine: Thank you for being here. I love, I think that’s like my favorite part is just doing the intro. I wish I had like lights, camera, action. So I, I know a little bit of your story, but take take us back to little Francine. Three, years old.

Francine Falk-Allen: Well, I was like any other three year old, very active until I contracted polio. And it starts out as a, you know, like you think you have the flu. Of course I didn’t know what it was. I’d been sick before, but ran a temperature for a week of about 100, which is a lot for a kid. And then after that started showing symptoms of paralysis. So I was put in a hospital for two weeks when my parents couldn’t touch me or, and I don’t think they visited me very much because it was too upsetting for everyone and they figured it’d be better to just let me be there until the quarantine period was over. And then I went to a rehab facility and I was there for six months. They told my parents I would never walk again, I’d be in a wheelchair my whole life. And that wasn’t my future. So the physical therapists were very helpful and they got me up and walking and by the time I was six, I was not wearing a brace anymore. Course now, I’m 77 and when I was in my late 50s or early 60s, I started having symptoms of post polio, which is when you begin, to have early weakness every, everybody’s motor Neurons wear out as we age, but for polio people, it happens sooner. So I had a childhood of. Of challenges, and, But I’ve cultivated a lot of friendships, and there were kids that were mean, and there were kids that took care of me, and it just varied. You know, children can be just like today. Today it’s online bullying a lot of times, and then it was in person, physical bullying. So, it teaches you to be stronger than you want to be. That’s essentially true. And it affected my relationships and my choice of career. I couldn’t do something where I’d have to be standing up a lot, that type of thing. So it’s been, a lot of ups and downs. I’m married. I’ve been married for, what, almost 27 years. We were together five years before that, and, tried to live a life like everybody else’s, although it hasn’t been exactly like everybody else’s. And I started writing in my, early 60s.

Wendy Valentine: Yeah, I know. We were talking about that earlier. And so what did you do before that? What was your career before you started writing?

Francine Falk-Allen: I had a career in bookkeeping, and tax work. I had a degree. I have a. I have a, B.A. in managerial, accounting. And I went into tax work, which is really grueling. It’s not an easy career. And. And. But I did form a lot of friendships. It’s, It’s one of those things where you, end up having a support group for tax preparers, you know, and. And we still have really good friendships from that. But I liked my clients a lot, so I stuck with it for a long time.

You had mentioned about, like, you would have chosen something else

Wendy Valentine: You had mentioned about, like, you would have chosen something else. Right. But you couldn’t stand for too long, so.

Francine Falk-Allen: Well, you. You can always say, I wish I would have done this. I wish I would have done that. But, But, I really liked architecture. The thing is, with architecture in those days, it was very difficult for a woman to break into it. And I talked with a girlfriend who was an architect. I’ve only known, like, three women architects in this.

Wendy Valentine: I know. I think. Yeah.

Francine Falk-Allen: Now that.

Wendy Valentine: I think I don’t know that many. I think maybe one or two.

Francine Falk-Allen: Yeah. And I talked with, actually, a couple of them a couple times, and they said, the thing is, Francine, you have to climb around in construction sites and stuff, and it’s a little bit dangerous. And, if you have a tendency towards tripping and falling, you’d really be at risk. And I do. I mean, because one of my legs is mostly Paralyzed, so. So I thought, okay, well, maybe I wouldn’t have been able to do that so well. But you know, there’s. I don’t know, I don’t know what other career I might have had. I looked into, ah, PR work because I like to make a lot of connections between people and I keep in touch with hundreds of people. But, with PR work, you have to work your way up in a company usually. It’s not usually something where you go in and say, I’m going to be your PR person. You build on the relationships that you have and it takes many years to do that. So I couldn’t really switch over to public relations either. So I just stuck with tax work. It was okay. Yeah.

Wendy Valentine: I was going to ask you, did you enjoy it?

Francine Falk-Allen: Well, I like puzzles, I like figuring things out, I like doing research. And what I didn’t like was the stress of it that, you know, I had contractors come in and cry in my office because they made a lot of money, but they spent it and they didn’t have money to pay their taxes and they would just break down, you know, oh, I can’t pay $6,000. And I’d be like, yeah, I know what that’s like because I’m going to owe $6,000 too. You know, I just listened to it and the stress of the deadlines was horrible. You know, 70 hour work weeks and sometimes I’d have my head down on my desk at 10:00 at night and just, why did I get into this? You know? But I really liked my clients and I liked helping them not pay as much tax as they would have paid if they did it on their own. So, yeah, yeah.

Friends would say to you, you should write a book about disability

Wendy Valentine: How did, how did the whole writing thing come about?

Francine Falk-Allen: Friends would say to me, you should write a book. Because I would, when, when we were especially in my tax group, we would email each other what was going on with our, you know, in our personal lives. And I would remember things that happened throughout my life and I would send them little vignettes. Oh, that reminds me of this story. And I’d write like a few paragraphs and, and people kept saying, you should write a book, you write well. You know, and I always like to write. So I thought, well, what would I write about? And I thought, well, there’s one thing I know a lot about, and that is living with a disability, with a lifelong disability. So I thought, okay, I’ll write my memoir. And I did. And I rewrote it 17 times. It was my first book, was a Lot of work I had. I tried, two or three different editors and landed with one that I really love, and she really got my voice and really helped me. there were. There were times when one time she said, you have to. I think I mentioned this to you before, you have to cut the chapter about your father because the book’s too long. I said, no, no. I got this at night and I cried. And I wrote her this long email back. I said, that’s really important to me because it was not only having a disability affected my relationships with men later on, you know, whether they were going to be with me or not. It’s one thing to have a girlfriend, it’s another thing to have a wife with a disability. And it took me a long time to understand that. But also, because I lost my father so young, I was really focused on guys, you know, I just thought it was so important to have a guy in your life, because I didn’t. Hadn’t had one. So the loss of my father was as significant for me as having had polio. So she gets the email. She. She called me in the morning and she said, it’s okay. That’s something else. So we decided to cut out the material that was basically self help. And that’s what was the beginning of no Spring Chicken, the book that talks about traveling with a disability and how to. There’s a lot of, material in there about the yoga that I do every morning and the pool exercises I do and places that you can go that are easy for a person with a disability to travel or even. You know, there are a lot of people that are starting to get wonky knees in midlife, and it’s more difficult to walk long distances. So there’s a lot of. A lot of material in there about how to enjoy your life, even if it’s getting more difficult physically. Boy, I’m just chattering, oh, no, it’s good.

Wendy Valentine: It’s so good. I’m like, oh, my God. There’s so many, like, bullet points just from that, what you just said. But it’s amazing that you’ve used your life in such a positive way. whereas some people, like, we all have choices, right, of something horrible happens to us. We can either go this way or we can go that way. And you chose to make something positive with all of it, and you’re still going. You haven’t stopped.

Francine Falk-Allen: That’s true. That’s true. And, I’ve had this conversation with several other people that have disabilities, that have lifelong disabilities, particularly polio survivors. Not everyone had residual paralysis, but almost all of us end up having early, weakness and fatigue. And, in some ways it’s, it’s almost psychologically easier to have a lifelong disability because you have a lot of time to adapt to it and get used to it. and people who have something happen, like a stroke or loss of limb or something like that later in life, it’s depressing because you, you were used to having a fully functional body, and now something really important seems to be gone or is gone. So it’s, it’s like, it’s almost like loss of a spouse or loss of a best friend or something like that. It affects you every single day. A lot of people, you know, it’s, it’s. It’s hard for them to adapt to that. So we’ve had a whole lifetime. Oh. Oh, yeah. I know it hurts. Oh, yeah. I have to use crutches again. Well, at least it’ll be temporary. Well, it might not be temporary, but I’ll do something else if I can’t do that. You know, that’s an attitude that, that you develop when you’ve had long, term disability.

Wendy Valentine: It’s interesting that you say that because I had a conversation with a friend a couple weeks ago and, we were saying, like, her husband actually had not had an amazing childhood. Like one of those, like, wee, everything was wonderful and like cupcakes and ice cream and everything’s great, and everyone treated him well and, but. But then had trauma as an adult, and I’d wondered about that. I was like, you know, I wonder. I had trauma, well, a lot of trauma throughout my life, but especially even as a child. And I kind of going back to what you’re saying, it’s like you almost. Not that you want a child to ever experience any type of trauma or heartbreak, any of that, but you almost learn to adapt. Like, you become more resilient, and when things come your way, you’re like, okay, I figured that out. I can do that. I can do that. Whereas like you were saying, if you ex. If you don’t experience any of that until later on in life, then it’s like, how do.

Francine Falk-Allen: I mean, you don’t have the tools. Yeah, yeah, right. Yeah, that’s true.

Wendy Valentine: Yeah. And, and. But I think it’s what’s so cool with human beings. We are very resilient if we give ourselves permission to be. And if. And it’s like becoming your own best friend and saying, okay, you got this. I can do this, I can do.

Limiting beliefs and the negativity that was swirling around your mind

I was Going to ask you, how did you, like, between the bullies growing up and then with your. With your dad, like, how did you overcome some of those doubts and those limiting. Limiting beliefs and the negativity that was swirling around in your mind and in your heart and even about, like, with your own body? How did you. How did you overcome that?

Francine Falk-Allen: I think it takes time. It’s not something that you just, you know, do one thing and. And, oh, now I’m fine. It’s like that, really. And I mean, I shed a lot of tears. I was particularly focused, on. Because I lost my dad so early. I was so focused on getting a boyfriend that I thought that was the most important thing, along with getting a career, because my mother sort of gave me the. The subtle, message without saying it, that I might never get married because I couldn’t walk like other girls and that type of thing, you know. So, So, So that. So it became really important, you know, and, both of those things, having a career and, and having a boyfriend and. I don’t know, over time, I guess. In my. I mean, I had boyfriends. I had an early marriage in my 20s. It didn’t work out. He was an alcoholic. It was really difficult. And after having a few boyfriends, it finally hit me late, you know, in m. Maybe in my 40s, that it didn’t really matter that I had the capacity to have a good life without a partner if. If that happened. And looking back, I realized, you know, you’ve had a bunch of boyfriends, so probably it’s going to happen again. You’re probably not going to die alone. And if you did, you have a lot of girlfriends. You know, you have like, a lot of different things that you can focus on. I always liked music. Music was a savior for me a lot of times. And I got into meditation work when I was in my late 20s and early 30s. That helped, you know, doing. Doing things that. That, you know, focusing on. one meditation teacher gave me a meditation of, focusing on the fragrance of a rose, just imagining the fragrance of a rose every morning because he knew I didn’t have an easy time. And that’s a beautiful thing to focus on. And it actually improved my sense of smell. I could smell a jar of open peanut butter from the other room after a while, you know, so. So, it just. It takes time. You know, over time you start to see, you know, you can make your life turn out. You can make your life. I mean, it’s like even when something happens. I had breast cancer 20something years ago. And, I got through it. You know, it was. It didn’t kill me. And I went through the treatment and it was difficult. And here I am, you know, it was 20 years ago. So in that, I realized that’s not everybody’s story. You know, not everyone is fortunate that way. But I don’t know, I think resilience is something that it’s. It’s like a. A tool that you learn to lose over. Learn to use over time.

Wendy Valentine: Yep. Yeah, it just. It’s like a muscle. You just have to keep strengthening it. Right.

How healing were writing your books for you

I was going to ask you something. Oh, that’s what it was. Your books. How. How healing were those for you, just writing your books?

Francine Falk-Allen: Well, it was. It’s a type of healing that it’s not just relief. It’s learning to look at how you look at your life. the first person who was, a Beta reader for me is. Is a woman who used to review books when she lived in Scotland. She. She had done about 250 books for the Scotsman, the biggest paper in Edinburgh. And, so she read it, and she’s a good friend, and she. She sent me notes and. And she said, you know, you’re blaming people. You’re pointing fingers at people. This is. You need to take a step back. And I was, I was. I was p* off that people hadn’t treated me better because of my disability. You know, the things that. The unkind things a lot of people had done were, were like a focus for me in a lot of ways and was like, sort of coming from limitation rather than ability. And, so I went through and made more I statements and, changed it to read this is what happened to me. And then people can make their own judgment about it. I was saying things like, you need to be more aware of, what disabled people go through. The way to tell that story, the way to tell the story is this is what happened to me and let people do what they will with it. So it was healing in that way. And then also, writing the chapter about my dad’s death was, pretty cathartic. It’s not something you ever completely get over, but I hadn’t. When I was a child, they would tell me not to cry. They would say, oh, it’s okay, because at that time in the 50s, you didn’t send children to therapy. Women didn’t go to therapy. That was for crazy people. So my mother wasn’t in therapy. And, if I cried in the classroom thinking about my dad. Right after, you know, like six months after it had happened, the teacher took me in the back of the room and said, now you just stop and you get yourself together, and when the recess happens, you go outside and play. So the message I got was, you don’t cry over things like that. You know, even though I did by myself. So I hadn’t really worked through all of that stuff until. And I. I did a lot of therapy too. I did a lot of therapy, but. Yeah, yeah, so. So it was healing in. Because I. I began to look at how I was looking at the world and presenting myself to other people and my expectations of other people. So those are the kinds of healing things that happen in writing my memoir.

How old were you when your dad passed away? Maybe you said that

Wendy Valentine: How old were you when your dad passed away? Maybe you said that and I didn’t catch it.

Francine Falk-Allen: I was, just under seven.

Wendy Valentine: Oh, gosh, that is a lot for a little girl between the polio and then your dad’s passing within four years.

Francine Falk-Allen: And my. And my mother was kind of mean too. She was a paddler. She used a wooden paddle on me, and she had done that on my brother and sister as well. My brother and sister were from m. A different marriage, so they were, older teenagers when I was born. My mother felt that. That my dad should have a child too, so. So they weren’t really. They were more like an aunt and an uncle to me. They didn’t really live with me most of the time. But, yeah, that. There were three big strikes for me. polio, being beaten by my mom until I was about 8, and my dad dying with. So young. It was. That’s. That’s a lot for a kid to handle. It may be a little adult too early. Ah. and another thing that happened from that is when I was in my 20s, of course, it was the 60s, and everybody was pretty footloose. And, and I was. I was a little wild, you know, I. I just wanted to be free of all of that that I had been through. So that was another phase. It was fun, though.

Wendy Valentine: Escaping, you know, can be fun sometimes. A little escapism. M can be a little healthy. My God, you deserved it.

Francine Falk-Allen: Well, now my escapism is reading good fiction, you know, watching movies. That’s good enough. Let them do it.

Wendy Valentine: But your story and stories, like your life story, is proof that you can break through it. And you don’t have. You don’t have to, like, wear it all, like, out in the open. Like, this happened to me, like. Yep, it happened, but I gotta keep moving forward.

Francine Falk-Allen: Right.

Wendy Valentine: You have to keep going.

Francine Falk-Allen: Right, right, right. I think, I think my teen years and my twenties were more the this happened to me phase, you know, and then it was like, you know, people want somebody that they can have a good time with, not somebody that, you know, goes through their litany all the time. And I do think it’s important to have friends and, or, or a therapist that you can, you know, talk about the difficulties with. For sure.

Wendy Valentine: It’s amazing that you were doing meditation probably, what, in the 70s?

Francine Falk-Allen: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Wendy Valentine: That’s because, you know, like, meditation is finally getting to be a, Okay, well, you’re not meditating. Oh my gosh. You know, but that’s great.

Francine Falk-Allen: For a while I wasn’t. And when I started having more pain in my body, which is another thing that happens. And well, for, for many people late in life, in 50s, 60s and 70s, you start to experience joint and muscle pain sometimes. But for polio people, it comes a little bit early. And so about 10 years ago, I started meditating again because it really, it’s not like it makes the pain go away, but it makes it less important. And it also, you know, you notice it and you go, oh yeah, that happened. You know, so unless it’s severe, severe pain is really hard to, to just meditate away.

Wendy Valentine: Yeah, I’ve tried that too. I’m like, oh, please, just smell the.

Francine Falk-Allen: Road help right now.

Wendy Valentine: The rose and the peanut butter.

A lot of people fear change especially as they’re getting older

So a lot of people do actually fear change, especially as they’re getting older. So what advice do, do you have for them to, you know, to push through a lot of that fear and to go after the things that they love.

Francine Falk-Allen: I feel like it’s partly just a matter of focus. If you focus on what’s wrong, that’s what you see. So one thing that I used to do when, you know, I’d be really upset about a breakup of a, with a boyfriend or something like that or, or something wasn’t going well in my career. Go for a drive someplace beautiful, go to a park, take a book, listen to some music. Music really is healing for me. If a person’s not, you know, audio based so much, then perhaps visual would be, you know, more important for them. Or, or maybe getting a massage if you can afford it. but I, I think you, you have to distract yourself just like you distract a child and change your focus to what can you do about this? And what, what would make you feel good right now? You know, what would make m. A lot of times for Me, like if my husband and I have had an argument or something. We have a pool. It’s a warm water pool. I need that. That’s the only kind of exercise that really works for me other than yoga and, going out there and walking in the pool. And I, I have a facility to turn on some music out there, listen to music, walk back and forth, do a little exercise in the water. I feel a lot better when I come back in the house and I’m more able to have the discussion or table it, you know, not be deep into it. So yeah, I think, I think you have to, you have to say, wait a minute, what do I want to focus on? Do I want to focus on the pain, the upset? it’s there and it may not just go away. But what would, what, what would have me feel more peaceful right now, you know?

Wendy Valentine: Yeah. You almost like find your own toolbox, if you will, of tools that work for you, like when you’re having a bad day or a bad moment. And I have found for me, and it’s taken me, you know, 52 years to figure this out. There are some days, you know, you’re just having a s** day, like you can’t shake the s** mood. And I’ve learned, I’m like, you know what? Yeah, I’m just in a bad mood today and I cannot seem m to break out of it. And I know when I go to bed at night and I wake up tomorrow, it’s going to be totally different and I’ll. I usually always feel better and I’m like, it’s horrible.

Francine Falk-Allen: Get a new start.

Wendy Valentine: I don’t know like what it is, but, but I’ve. I used to get so frustrated if I was having a bad day or like, if I was having aches and pains or whatever the case is, like, I would try to force it into something positive and I’d try to feel good about it. When I was like, you know what? I really just don’t want to feel good right now. Like, I’m just gonna.

Francine Falk-Allen: Yeah. Deal with it. You have to acknowledge what is in order to move on to something else, that’s for sure. It stays stuck in things longer, I think, when you try to avoid what’s going on. But. Well, just a matter of not, not dwelling in it. That’s the thing, you know, that’s. That’s the thing. It’s. And, and you know, like losing a friend. I mean, I’m in an age group when my girlfriends die, my, you know, relatives and Friends are dying. That’s what happens. And, and you know, it took me months to get over my sister’s death. She’s a lot older, so of course she went first. And, and it’s, it’s just, you know, you have to allow yourself that.

Wendy Valentine: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’ve told this story before too. My, My ex husband had passed away. He was only 26 years old when he passed away. And then I never, I never grieved. You know, I was, I was, ah. I was a single mom with two kids. I didn’t have time. I was like, I, I gotta keep going. I got like working three jobs and blah, blah, blah. And then 20, about 20 years later, my brother died. And I remember right, right before I was leaving, I was packing my suitcase to go to Dallas, to see him. You know, he was in a coma. And I looked in the mirror and I literally said to myself, I’m like, this time you’re grieving. Like, I’m. And it was the greatest. It sounds crazy to say it was like the greatest gift I gave to myself was to actually grief, no matter how ugly it was. And it got so ugly, you know, depression, anxiety. But I, you know, I, as a perfectionist and a people pleaser and a codependent, I was always the one to like, let me be happy for everyone and I’m just gonna, you know, shove all my feelings down and always smile and, and I was like, not this time. Was like, I’m going to have like an ugly grieving process. And I’m okay with that. Speak. That’s my mom calling. Sorry everyone. I was like, my, my mom’s calling. but yeah, I mean, it’s, you have to do that for yourself and just embrace it and you’ll get through it. And, and, and I think the more that you face it, it’s almost easier coming out of it.

Francine Falk-Allen: It’s like, oh, yeah, yeah, it go. It actually goes more quickly if you, if you, let yourself. And I.

Another thing I’ve noticed about grief is it’s a transcendent state

Another thing I’ve noticed about grief is it’s sort of like, I don’t know, it’s hard to explain this, but it’s sort of like a transcendent state. It’s kind of illuminating. It’s sort of like suddenly everything is, is in sharp focus and, and you know, you care about everything. You feel really vulnerable and, and everything outside is more beautiful than, than the day before. I mean, there’s a certain kind of, I don’t know, it’s like translucent appreciation of life.

Wendy Valentine: Yeah. Yeah.

Francine Falk-Allen: Grief Brings.

Wendy Valentine: Yeah, it’s like. It’s, Like the dark cloud is over you for so long, you’re just like, oh, my God, give me some sunlight, please. And then when, like, the cloud finally lifts, like, oh, thank God it’s over. And it’s never really over, as, you know, but it’s just not as dark. You’ll have those little dark moments. And you and I talked about this just in writing the books, when you have to relive those moments, it’s almost like you. I mean, you talk about the, The meditation of smelling the rose, and you got to the point you can literally smell the peanut butter because it, like, improved your senses, right?

Francine Falk-Allen: Yeah.

Wendy Valentine: And it’s almost like you can relive those moments, especially like, when you’re. You’re writing it and you’re trying to tell it from, you know, little Francine. Right. It’s like. It’s there. You can practically like it, feel it, and see the people that are in those scenes. And it’s such a. It’s tough, but it’s also very therapeutic.

Francine Falk-Allen: It’s therapeutic in it. And it’s a. It’s a gift, I have to say.

Going through a lot of experiences in life has made me a better writer

Well, I’m. I want to. I want to bring this in. Going through a lot of experiences in life has made me a better writer. And my third book, the. Which is, historical, ah, fiction based on family history. a story I found out about at a. At a, a memorial service for one of my uncles. My. My mother came from a family of, like, 12 children. She was born in 1908, and her mother actually bore 14 children with my grandfather. And I’m at this memorial service, and, my aunt says, well, when we were in the orphanage. What are you talking about? What orphanage? Well, my grandfather had put the five youngest kids in an orphanage in 1929. And, it makes you think, oh, it was because of the Depression and everybody had financial difficulty, but that was not the reason. And she told me all these things that my mother had never told me. So I had to write this book because it just seemed like a really intriguing story. This is. This is the COVID of it. That’s an actual picture of my grandparents. And, you know, I. I looked at this picture and I thought, my gosh, she. She was, like 18 or something, and she was so hopeful and happy that she was getting married. And my grandfather’s sitting there. I’m the man. And I knew my grandfather. I didn’t know her. So when I. When I wrote the story, I had all my life experience to bring to it. I knew what it was to go through a difficult marriage. I knew the kinds of things that she might have said, you know, even though I never knew my grandmother. So I, the. The sadness that I had been through and the joy were tools for me in this. In this book. You know, I, I could. I could imagine the kinds of conversations that happened. My grandmother was just popping one kid out after another out, which I, I never had children, but I know that it’s a lot of work and having that many in a small house. My mother became the second little mother, my mother and my aunt and, the two oldest girls. And my mother left home early because she just. She wanted to get clean bath water on the weekend and, you know, not have to take care of kids all day long. And so anyway, my life experience informed the emotional content of this book. So I. I’m glad for it. I’m glad for it, you know, that I went through a lot of different things because I knew what it was like to face difficulty and find, a way through it. And my grandmother had had a. A really, there’s a happy ending for her. But, But my grandparents did split up, and there were sort of surprising reasons for that. So anyway, yeah, that’s in the book.

Wendy Valentine: That’s why we have to buy the book. Oh, my God.

You talk about your mother being extremely strict and cruel in your memoir

Did you start to, like, as you were looking back at all those and hearing all those stories from the past and hearing about your mom as a teenager and a child and learning more about how she grew up, did you start to kind of. Yeah. Make even like, connecting the dots, if you will, from her life and then to yours and.

Francine Falk-Allen: Oh, absolutely, absolutely. In. In my memoir, I talk about how she. She tended to be extremely strict and cruel. You know, we were paddled. All of us were paddled with wooden implements. And, And, you know, I realized she got that from her parents.

Wendy Valentine: Yep.

Francine Falk-Allen: So I, I kind of like. I kind of wanted to vindicate my grandmother’s, behavior because she did some things that led to. To the end of the marriage. But I, didn’t blame her because I knew my grandfather, and he was a really vindictive person, and he passed that trade on to my mom. She was vindictive. You know, she would. If she got mad at you, she might not speak to you for a year. You know, it was. And that was just like my grandfather. So I did tie those things together. I did tie those. And. And some of my aunts and uncles were more forgiving People. So I had that to bring to their personalities. It was a hard time for women in those days. And we. We, you know, we. We. We face challenges, but, boy, you know, her whole life was about changing diapers and making food and trying to budget because my grandfather was gone all the time. He was a railroad man. So she was home alone with one, you know, one kid, two kids, three kids, four, eight, 10, 12, you know, cannot even imagine.

Wendy Valentine: Yeah. So you were probably feeling more compassion and empathy for. Despite, like, the. I mean, just knowing what she’d been through.

Francine Falk-Allen: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, I wrote her as a sympathetic character for the most part. Both of them. Both of them, you know, paddled their kids. That’s what people did then. Yeah. You had to shape them. I saw this. I saw this. Well, I found my sister’s baby book when I was going through a bunch of stuff a number of years ago, and I sent it to, my niece, but I read through it first. And in the back of the book, this is my mother’s first child. She writes a letter to my sister, who’s a baby at the time, and she says, my dear little daughter, I hope that you will grow up to be exactly the kind of woman I want you to be. It wasn’t, I hope you have a wonderful life. I hope that you have lots of creative experiences. I hope you meet lots of people and go lots of places. Basically, it was, I hope you turn out just like me. And I thought, well, no wonder my mom was disappointed in me. You know, I did not follow the course that she would have thought would have been, this is the way you be a woman. You know,

Wendy Valentine: That’S so great, though. You stood your ground and you. You followed your heart and your soul instead of just doing exactly what you’re, you know, what your mom wanted you to do or even society or you didn’t listen to the bullies. And that’s a lot of courage.

Francine Falk-Allen: I, originally in high school, I hoped to be an artist, and I went to art school for three years before I switched over and got my accounting degree. Because I realized that’s a really tough way to make a living, if you can make any living at all, you know, And. And I felt like, you know, I wasn’t. I wasn’t the most inspired artist I could have, like, done greeting cards or something. And then I realized that I had to. I had to work in, you know, New York, Los Angeles, Dallas, those, you know, Chicago. And I was not a city girl, you know, and. And So I quit art school, and my mother was just fit to be tied, to use an expression she would have used. She was so angry with me because her ideal was for me to be an artist too, you know, And. And yes, I wanted that, but I saw that it was unrealistic. So she was so angry with me when I quit. Quit college and I. I became a seamstress for a while, and then I went back to school. I worked and supported myself through two years of college to get my B.A. you know, and it was funny. My sister was really proud of me. She said, we’re going to Francine’s graduation, her college graduation. And she had to talk my mother into going because she was still angry that I didn’t become an artist.

Wendy Valentine: What would she. What would she say now with you being an author?

Francine Falk-Allen: Well, she probably wouldn’t like some of the things I’ve written about her, you know? Yeah, you shouldn’t tell that. You shouldn’t tell that. You shouldn’t tell. You’re airing our dirty laundry. Because she came. She kept all this stuff secret about what her parents did, you know, that her dad put. Put his kids in an orphanage. And the reason he did that was not nice. So anyway, yeah, she. She definitely would not have liked me to be telling all these things.

Wendy Valentine: She’d probably like the. The no spring chicken one. She’d probably like that one.

Francine Falk Allen’s books are available any place books are sold

Francine Falk-Allen: Yeah. Yeah, that’s probably true. That’s probably true. And, it’s funny when I. I took a trip with a group of Sufis, when I was deeply into that work and meditation and mysticism, and I went to, India and Pakistan and Egypt and Israel, and. And, the last week or two, some of us went through Europe. Just quick trip. And my mother always referred to it as my trip to Europe. And, And I said, mom, you know, I went to all these places that were, like, not so easy, you know, and. And we were. We were seeking spiritual truth. It wasn’t. It wasn’t just a vacation.

Wendy Valentine: Yeah.

Francine Falk-Allen: Yeah, it was really funny that she always called it Francine’s trip to Europe. Yeah.

Wendy Valentine: At least you can find humor in it all now.

Francine Falk-Allen: Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Wendy Valentine: well, where can we find you? And most importantly, buy your books?

Francine Falk-Allen: Well, my books are available any place books are sold. You can just call up the bookstore and say, I like to. I like to support independent bookstores. We have a couple here in our area that we love, and they. There are centers for cultural diversity here in the Bay Area, but you can call up any bookstore and ask for them and they can order them. They’re all distributed by Simon Schuster. So easy to get them. Of course, you can get them through Amazon, but what Amazon?

Wendy Valentine: Really?

Francine Falk-Allen: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, I, think even, Target and Walmart may have them too. But not all of those big box stores carry everything. They have limited book inventory. But. And my website, has links through to, bookshop.org which is, it funnels the money to your, your bookstore, of choice. Or you can get, you can link to Amazon on my website as well. It’s Francine Falk Allen dot com. It’s F R A N C I N E F A L K D A L L dot com. And that’s got, bits about each of my books and, where you can buy them.

Wendy Valentine: So. Fascinating. And you, do you have a. You have a book signing coming up? There was that flyer, I think, that I saw. What was. Is it May? May. What am I saying? Is it March?

Francine Falk-Allen: There’s a February. I’m going to be at, the pier, 23 in San Francisco. There’s a book fair, and there will be 25 women authors there selling their books, probably at a discount.

Wendy Valentine: Yeah. So if you’re in the area, make sure you check that out. Well, thank you so much. You are a fascinating woman and I am just so happy I met you.

Francine Falk-Allen: Yes. Wendy, thank you so much for the opportunity. It was really great to hang out with you for a while.

Wendy Valentine: Yeah, I know. We could talk all day about all sorts of good stuff. All right, thank you, everyone. Have a great day.