Clearer to Ourselves presents to its readers prose and poetry covering the span of Mary Talley's adult life as she sought to make meaning. In partnership with Bettie Currie, her partner of nearly 50 years, Mary Talley lived a life of spiritual exploration as she experimented with writing about her life, their lives together, and her discoveries and observations along the way. The core of her life was her search for truth and meaning. Yoked firmly with that spiritual search was her radical commitment to living the quality of life those spiritual findings led her to live.
Born in Waco, Texas and holding degrees from Austin College and Vanderbilt University, Mary taught Presbyterian Missionary children in the Congo and college English in Richmond and Washington, DC. She worked at the U. S. Dept. of Health Education and Welfare and other government agencies. After a trip to the Findhorn Community in Scotland where she and Bettie experienced a vision for a different way of living, they decided to leave DC to live on Hatteras Island in Frisco, NC where they raised ducks, grew vegetables, fished, and cleaned cottages when they needed money. After 24 years in Frisco, they moved to a retirement community in Virginia Beach where Mary died in 2013. Mary was a modest pioneer whose aspirations for obedience and faithfulness led to a life of simplicity, integrity, community, and peace. These writings tell her story.