My background is varied. I have a B.S., with a multiple major in accounting, pre med, art, and literature. (I had trouble making up my mind, as you can tell!! My education ended with a pHD in International Communications. An amusing topic as I’m known as quite a talker, thus the name “gabbylynne”.
Long before I finished my education, I spent many years as an art instructor in a private store in a large city and also taught workshops in varied forms of art through my church and civic societies.
I started my life as an artist at the age of 4, my earliest remembrance. My parents lived in a small town and before they knew what I was doing, I had gone door to door, selling my art for a quarter! Needless to say, my Mother was not pleased at my wandering, but luckily for me, my Father was proud of my ability to step out and try something new.
That was the beginning of my life as an artist.
I continued with my art through two years of university, then, due to marriage and children, I took a break from school. Even though I was not taking formal lessons, my art continued to dominate my life, through the teaching, and as a natural part of my life.
At the age of 30, my life took an unexpected turn, and I was forced to make a decision as to how I would be able to support two children on my own. Thus, the B.S. degree with the accounting major. In the end, I decided to take the exam to become a Certified Public Accountant, passed the first time, and accepted a position as an auditor at one of the largest firms in the world. I stayed there a number of years, as a manager.
I taught at the University of Oklahoma for two years before I started and ran my own CPA firm for a few years, during which I gained a partner and a client who hired both of us exclusively to run his own business.
I started as the CFO of this company and stayed until that company was a fully owned major stock company listed on the stock exchange. I fully enjoyed the challenge of taking this company from a small, nearly bankrupt, company to a fully profitable public company, but always, in my heart and life I was an artist.
I left that company to go back to my art. It should be noted that during all of the years, I had never abandoned my art. In fact, I kept an easel near my bed, woke at night and painted nearly every night.
My activities also included extensive travel, which I continue to enjoy, for three reasons.
* Pleasure
* Business
* Charity: I gathered donations from drug companies and arranged for them to be taken to underprivileged countries, accompanied by myself and four others who have similar values and desires.
During one of these trips, I was granted an honorary international doctoral degree in “International Communications” from the University of Moscow.
I come from Northern New Mexico, have traveled half of the world, love to read, love to learn, but most of all, I am where I was when I was 4.
I am an artist. I am a photographer. I shoot under the name River Photography and you can see my photographs at Flickr, DeviantArt, and my own web pages.
Please feel free to browse through my other photo links listed in the Links Page in this blog. You might find something else you like.
Please enjoy and let me know what you think.
Prof Lynne S Walters, PhD
From the front page of the Russian newspaper, under the header, ”The American’s brought us hot water!” The short story is that the entire city’s water supply temperature was/is controlled by a central location. Stories told to me spoke about the hot water being turned off as punishment for a perceived infraction, as well as to save money. When we got there, they turned on the hot water. 
I was grateful. The child was from a preschool we visited. The children were entranced with seeing that the people they thought were the enemy, were, in fact, quite nice people and brought them many things. This story is written in another place. If you are interested, leave me a comment and I will direct you to it.
