About Crystal

For as long as I can remember, I have always loved people. As a child, I was always friendly and outgoing. My Grandmother, the love of my life, had me involved in every conceivable activity to keep me engaged and out of trouble. I was in the choir at church and in school, on the drill team, on the usher board, the volleyball, track, and basketball teams even though I couldn’t shoot worth a darn. And then, when I was old enough I became a debutante in the Red Rose Cotillion. Another of my Grandmother’s creations.

Before I knew it, I was off to college at Seattle University. The choice of a college showed the first chink in my [friendly and outgoing] armor, as I refused to go more than 32 miles away from home in Tacoma, Washington even though my Grandmother wanted to send me to Spellman in Atlanta, GA. I came up with all kinds of reasons why I should go to Seattle instead of Atlanta. And for the first time ever, she bought it, and let me stay close to home.

The truth; I was scared to death. Scared to be away from everything and everyone I knew. Afraid to [need] to make new friends.

You see, in the small pond of Tacoma, Washington where my Grandmother seemed to run everything, all I had to do was show up, and people that I had never met would recognize me and say “You’re Frances Wilkinson’s grandchild aren’t you?”. With that, I would stand up as straight and as tall as I could and say “Yes I am”. And that was that. I would be introduced to all sorts of people, ushered into special rooms, and treated like the daughter of the Queen.

But just 32 miles away at Seattle University, and unbeknownst to anyone else, I found myself breaking into a sweat at the thought of extending my hand and saying 3 simple words; “Hello, I’m Crystal”. By the time I got to Xerox, where I became a sales rep, the thought of introducing myself in a meeting or making a presentation was paralyzing, though I was fine one-on-one in a situation where I had all the answers.

When I moved to Los Angeles, California in 1982 through a transfer I requested with Xerox, I remember my Mom, who must have had some inclination that I was struggling with the prospect of anonymity, said to me “don’t come back here to Tacoma with your tail between your legs because you get out there to California and no one knows you or your Grandmother.”

There it was. Right in my face. No one would know me. I would actually have to put myself out there to meet people. I was terrified. And I stayed that way for a very long time. Years in fact until’ 1995.

I left Xerox in 1985 to represent a celebrity photographer. Six months later, in March of 1986 he fired me. But in a weird twist of fate, his favorite makeup artist asked me to be her agent. The reluctant decision to take on that challenge led me to write a book “The Hair Makeup & Fashion Styling Career Guide”. It was going to be a 16-page manual that gave aspiring artists the information they needed about portfolios, agencies and photographers to launch and sustain a freelance career in makeup, hair or fashion styling. It took me a year. When I finished writing it in 1995 it was 180 pages.

I self-published the book, because everyone I approached about publishing it thought I was crazy. “Hair makeup and what are you talking about” they would say. Funny to think that anyone doesn’t know what a fashion stylist is or does these days with people like Rachel Zoe; think Nicole Richie and Lindsay Lohan, and Patricia Field of Sex and the City. However, in the 90’s the term was still unknown to many people.

I hadn’t really thought about what 2000 books was going to look like, or how much space they would take up in the garage, until’ they were delivered to my home in LA. Those 2 pallets took up the space of one of our cars––my husband’s of course.

I was mortified. Here I had 2000 books, a few advanced mail orders for the books and no one to buy them. That was when I got over being shy. When the reality of those 2 pallets of books sitting in the garage with no buyers sunk in, out of necessity I reinvented myself into someone who could talk to anyone about anything. It was the reverse of being knocked in the head and waking up with amnesia. When I came to, I was not only a self-published author, but a promoter, publicist, and soon to be speaker.

My mother still shakes her head. Can’t figure it out. My sister the communicator who became an attorney was to be the writer speaker in the family. But while she is now on a path to becoming a judge, I discovered my voice. My God given gift to educate, uplift, inspire, and move.