I know you are a man who wears many hats, please tell us about them and how you came to be a member of the Southern Collective Experience
I have been a health care attorney for 20 years. Currently, I am the Senior Vice President of External Affairs for Lakeland Regional Health (Lakeland, Florida). I oversee the strategic management of governmental relations and manage the Corporate Compliance Program.
My friend Kathy Harvey introduced me to the Southern Collective. I met Kathy in 2020 when my wife, Mary Lucia, and I visited the Pat Conroy Literary Center in Beaufort, SC. She has been like a “mother/sister” encouraging me to do more. She sent me a FaceBook post about submissions to Blue Mountain Review with a formidable directive to submit. From there SCE and I shared some ideas and discovered a lot of connections with arts and culture,
I joke that while I stood contemplating the line dividing the Great Yes and the Great No, Kathy pushed me over. She understood my call more than I did.
Finally, I refer to myself as an everyday mystic. I have experienced the intersection of Time and Timeless. The world for me is dualistic. As a result, I see things in wholes rather than parts.
Read the full interview with Michael Spake in The Blue Mountain Review, May 2023.
