Cyndie grew up in Fontana, California, the home of Kaiser Steel and Kaiser Permanente. As a child she wanted to be a Broadway dancer. She started taking dance when she was 2 1/2 and continued through high school. Her mother put her in dance because she had a lazy foot that turned in because she walked so young; she thought it would straighten the muscles in the foot. And Cyndie stayed with it - ballet, tap, jazz. When she was 14 she worked for a summer as a Can Can dancer at the Golden Horse Shoe Review at Disneyland.

When Cyndie graduated from high school she went to Chaffey College and then got a Bachelor's Degree in Political Science from Cal State San Bernardino. She realized she could never be a professional dancer because she wasn't tall enough. After graduation she moved to Hawaii where she got a job as a secretary to the sales department for a Yellow Pages directory. She moved to the Monterey Peninsula because she was dating a guy who was at Fort Ord. She continued doing office jobs. Eventually she decided to try to make more money so she became a commercial fisherman, at first from Moss Landing and then fishing for squid from Ventura. She quit after two years. She describes the reason, "There was an accident on the boat. If I had been where I normally stand I would have been severely injured or killed. The net snagged on the corner of the boat and the captain needed a flashlight and told me to go up and get it. Then the purse rope line snapped. I was not in my original place; I was coming down from the wheelhouse with the flashlight. And it scared me." She decided to go back to secretarial work and got a job at Val Strough Honda Mazda in Seaside.

At Val Strough she met Jody Gilmore. Jody was the service writer and she did all the warrantees. Jody was doing theatre at Unicorn. So Cyndie saw Unicorn's THE TWELFTH NIGHT and told Jody that if they ever needed any help at Unicorn to give her a call. They were getting ready to do ARSENIC AND OLD LACE and she thought it might be fun to help with costuming. She talked to Carey Crockett and ended up not helping with costuming but as the stage manager. She started on the premiere night of the play. She tells about it, " I wasn't sure what a stage manager was, so Jody kind of ran me through calling time. I met Colleen Finegan, the director, and she showed me where the props were, gave me a script, and pretty much marked everything off. She had it really organized so it was really easy to go in and just step in and do it. I just seemed to have a knack for it."

Cyndie continued stage managing for Unicorn. When they started rehearsing for A THREE PENNY OPERA Carey talked her into doing a "walk-on walk-off" part. Eventually Carey cast her as one of the prostitutes, even though Cyndie protested that she was "very shy at getting in front of a group and speaking and terrorized at debating or public speaking." And then she's totally tone-deaf. She tells about being in the chorus for THREE PENNY OPERA, " I lip-sync very well. Dania Ketcham was my other prostitute cohort. She has a wonderful voice. I tried to sing as quietly as possible. And by where she would put her hand on my shoulder or arm she would let me know if I needed to sing higher or lower." And she had about six lines which she had to say in a Cockney accent. The part was sort of "airheadish" so she could manage it and she was also kept busy doing all the stage managing/props.

Cyndie was getting to be known around the Peninsula for her work as stage manager/prop person. She describes what a stage manager does, "A little bit of everything. You make sure all the actors are there in time, that all the props are preset. You take care of anything that has to be moved from one location to another, anything that has to get onstage or offstage in the course of the play. I also do lots of set decoration, and then there are the props. A lot of times I borrow very expensive props, so I've taken the responsibility. I make sure they get covered up every night or whatever. Some props and costume pieces I bring from home."

The first time Cyndie actually auditioned for a part was at Unicorn for GUY THINGS, written and directed by Rob Foster. She was first cast as a bitchy, snobby attorney, but ended up playing a girl named Holly after two different people cast for the part had backed out. Being Rob's third choice left her a little insecure, but other actors in the play worked with her over and over until she got comfortable. Looking back at the tapes of the play, she still sees herself as very stiff. She continued doing a lot of things with Carey, including projects outside of Unicorn. They did the set for THE NUTCRACKER, a Dance Kids, Inc. ballet presented at the Golden Bough; Cindy did all the set dressing. And she built a Christmas tree with Carey for a private business in Pacific Grove. She continued doing props and stage managing at Unicorn. And then she was asked to do all the props for the Monterey Opera Company production of "Carmen," again presented at the Golden Bough with a cast of about 65. She also did the "on-deck" stage managing of that production. This was the first production she had been involved with independent of Carey. And then, around Christmas of 1998, Cyndie happened to be at Unicorn when a phone call came in. It was PBS and they were doing a segment on the Point Pinos Lighthouse as part of "Legendary Lighthouses of California." They wanted to do a historical re-enactment. Carey was too busy, so he let Cyndie handle the project. As with theatre projects, she had similar tasks - to gather actors and actresses (Marlie Avante played lighthouse keeper Emily Fish), gather costume pieces and work with the costumer, gather props, and coordinate with lighting people.

Cyndie had worked a lot with Neva Hahns at Unicorn. Neva recommended her to Elsa Kon who needed a stage manager for ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST. It turned out Elsa was looking for someone to play a bimbo/airhead, and since Cyndie felt the part was "close to home," she again was both stage manager/ prop person and actor in a production. Then Elsa recommended her to Conrad Selvig to do stage managing/ props for COLLECTED STORIES. Neva was also in that production and through her Cyndie met Terry Blum. Neva is on the Board of Directors of Children's Experimental Theatre and one evening Terry interrupted a line run-through for COLLECTED STORIES to talk to Neva about how they desperately needed more help in putting on a fundraiser for CET. Cyndie offered to help the day of the event, "I'm great at organizing and coordinating." And at the fundraiser Cyndie met Marcia Hovick. Her son Nick was directing THE CIRCLE for Staff Players and was looking for a stage manager. So Cyndie again was stage manager/prop person - for the SPRC/Nick Hovick directed productions of THE CIRCLE and TAKING CARE . And in March she will be in another SPRC production, WAITING IN THE WINGS. This time it will be totally as an actor, not stage manager/prop person. Cyndie says, "I'm just going to seriously concentrate on acting, because I feel I have a little bit of talent but I've never really had a chance to develop it."

Cyndie on the set of TAKING CARE

For a job, Cyndie currently does bookkeeping for a plumbing contractor who builds new tract homes around Monterey County. For creative satisfaction Cyndie does theatre. She explains why, "I enjoy seeing the magic come together. A lot of times I'm involved in a play from its conception right on through closing night to tear-down of the stage. There's a lot of great talent on this Peninsula, and it's wonderful to work with these people. I do have a little bit of an artistic and creative side, and it's great to be able to use it. There's a lot of creativity in doing this, to make it look like this is the most natural thing in the world. One of the hardest things I did for TAKING CARE was to make the floor look like a total mess, of paper, marking pens, paintbrushes, without it looking calculated. I'd still like to work with a costumer, maybe learn a bit about sewing and altering. I'm really good with colors and I coordinate with costumers, especially with accessories - hats, shawls, purses, things like that."

She explains another reason she likes doing theatre, "Theatre mimics real life so much. You think you've got it all together and then your lighting person doesn't show up and an actor doesn't show up, so you have to train a lighting person, learn lines to fill in for the missing actor, and stage manage/do props at the same time. I find that life is very much like that. Life is a constant working together process, and one of the great things is that I have so many people - friends and family - who help me and allow me to do theatre. They help with the day-to-day stuff - washing dishes at my house, packing props for me to bring to the theatre. It's part of the value of life. There are so many wonderful people out there. And you don't have to do big things. You can do a lot of little things and they count in a big way."