Trish Salerno, recently inspired by SMITH magazine, has published her six-word memoir, it is reprinted here with permission.  “Soaring spirit.  Tethered heart.  Endless befuddlement.”  Copies available upon request.  Prior to writing her memoirs, Trish worked for the James P. Shannon Leadership Institute of Saint Paul, MN as a group facilitator.  She continues her association with the Institute working to develop programming for their 500+ alumni.  However, she is doing her work from her beloved home in Louisville, KY and not in Minnesota where, despite what the native population claims, winter has been known to last for 6 months of the year.  Before joining the Shannon Institute, Trish was Executive Director of Arts Kentucky, a statewide service and advocacy organization whose mission is to provide resources and tools to people who are working to improve their communities through the arts.  Trish considers her greatest accomplishment at Arts Kentucky (besides mastering web design, t-shirt design, bumper sticker design and the fine art of email newsletters) to be the fact that most of the 400+ members thought she had a staff of 12, when in actuality it was a staff of 1.2. 

Trish served on the Board of Directors of the Arts & Cultural Attractions Council of Greater Louisville, Inc. and was instrumental in the creation of the city’s Cultural Blueprint.  If you are interested in seeing Trish lose all composure and any sense of rationality, please ask her:  “Hey, what ever happened with the Blueprint?”  She also served on the board of the National Community Arts Network, and The Pleiades Theatre Company. 

Trish has studied theatre with the Obie award winning director Anne Bogart and is a survivor of the Saratoga International Theatre Institute’s (SITI Co.) month long summer program in Saratoga Springs, NY.  She also studied with Tina Landau of Steppenwolf and participated in the 6^th Annual LaMaMa International Director’s Symposium in Spoleto, Italy. 

In her spare time Trish likes to listen to music (current playlist includes Sigur Ros; Emmylou Harris; Death Cab for Cutie; Shelby Lynne and Goldfrapp).  She enjoys cajoling her 3 year old niece into doing her Yoda impersonation, which is surprising good; designing backyard suspension bridges; sampling chocolate (dark only); determining escape routes, traveling (she is a certified Tour Guide/Director) and directing plays that few people actually feel compelled to see.   Just like Einstein, Trish believes that imagination is more important than knowledge.  It’s certainly more fun.