Judy Henion Nachand

Judy Dale Henion- Nachand
“I haven’t been around the world, but I’ve seen just about everything”. I was born and raised in Oregon and California. As a child, I lived in the country, riding horses, acting in family and church plays. I enjoyed spending my time drawing, writing, pretending, and playing with my siblings, cousins, and other children from the same church. I learned early to live life to its fullest despite the troubles thrown into my path. I guess it’s been told you can find me usually laughing and cracking jokes.
Once on my own, I did what most girls dreamed of, to be married and have kids. So, I did, but was a young girl and naïve, so I figured I found the guy that would dry up my tears and take me away. I hardly understood life and the journeys that would be ahead for me. Unfortunately, the marriage ended, though I was blessed with two great boys from that marriage, who now stand taller than I do.
Too soon after that I met my second husband, and it lasted fifteen years.
It was during my second marriage when I took song writing seriously. I would stay up late at night while everyone was sleeping and write another song. I chuckle when I look back at the number of folders and disks that accumulated over the years. Though my marriage fell on hard times and even a good country song couldn’t keep it together. One of my songs I wrote is called Rollercoaster Girl and it expresses how I felt during those tough times. “I don’t need your raindrops … slipping through my rooftop… two steps down to collapsing steps. I’m a rollercoaster girl not a TV wife…I’m not living this kind of life.”
I once again was blessed with raising four stepsons from the marriage and we had a beautiful daughter together and I had two boys of my own bringing his mine and ours into the marriage.
Throughout the past 30 years, I have owned a pet grooming studio, a family winery and worked as a care giver for the elderly.
I love people and animals, especially my cat Gizmo who lived to be 16 years old and some of my friends insisted she was from another planet. Gizmo passed away in 2010. I raised her since she was three days old on a bottle. She had a will to survive.
During the years taking care of my family, running the family winery, and the farm’s assorted livestock kept me pretty busy. I didn’t have the luxury of pursuing songwriting full time, though one of my songs says: “I know I shoulda if I coulda done that.”
After the winery went broke, and the marriage crashed, somehow nearly engulfed in pain, I returned to school and got back in touch with my writing, which allowed me to put my life’s travails into context. While in school, I worked as a caregiver for the elderly. Then I did a good old rebound thing and met a man and let my heart lead the way knowing this wasn’t even close to Mr. Right. Ha! Ha! I shoulda known better than that. We were doomed right from the beginning. I believe now you have to have a list and know what you want and what you will not accept. I lost the list!
So, with this new marriage on the rocks, we settled close to where I was born, and moved to the family farm where I grew up to be close to my grandparents to care for them. My grandpa had a few months to live, and I lived next door to them to be there during his last days. I decided to open my Grooming Parlor again where I originally had started it when I was 18 years old on the family farm. It gave my grandma, who is one of the most wonderful people on this earth, something to do to help her through my grandpa’s sickness and after he passed away. This was a great time in my life being with Grandma working together in the dog parlor.
My grooming parlor went well with Grandma helping me out but the marriage didn’t last.
Once again, my life took a change, and I was once again alone and heartbroken. So, I wrote a song that told what my life was like. It was called “So All She Got”
So my last final chance vividly came…. When I woke up and things weren’t the same…The drawers were open and her car was gone…The note read you never loved me so I left at dawn.
So again, I went on and learned from my past, and again my life took another change.
I met a man over the internet that, as luck would have it, lived only a stone’s throw away in the same little town. Even luckier, we hit it off from the start and shared the same ideals and goals. We both loved to write, both country people, both have kids, and he loved my cat. I loved him and he loved me too. How more perfect could it be than that?
Even good relationships may not last forever and again my life took a turn in a new direction, when we both knew we had to go our separate ways. Though this time it was different, he was a true and wonderful guy. He wasn’t mean or ugly just on a different journey than I. His traveling gypsy feet took him far beyond the sunset and I have always been a rooted gal who likes a good cup of coffee and a place to call her own.
Our friendship remains strong to this day, and we both are forever friends. So I once again was blessed with a wonderful friend and a wonderful stepdaughter. He is accepted and loved by my family, friends, children and even my new husband Chris. Chris says, “What would life be without Tim. He’s a great guy.”
So again I went on and even though the pain was some days more than I thought I could bear I did once again meet someone else.
I knew my life had more turns left and I knew I might as well smile through it and give it my best.
Finally, as life would have it, by coincidence I ran into a guy I went to high school with a guy who also had his feet firmly planted on Oregon soil.
I feel like I’m pretty lucky now even though life didn’t quite go the way I had expected. That white house and the white picket fence and the man I dreamed of didn’t quite turn out the way I had planned. I learned many lessons and endured more sad times than I like to remember. Like it has said, “When one door closes another one always opens.”
I feel now my life has finally come full circle and now at 67 I can honestly say life is what you make it.
Like one of my song says:
Cause all that hopin’ and lookin’ and passin’ me by
Has been keepin’ these blues away
Cause all that confusion was just an illusion
Just knowin’ the right one is comin’ my way
My pastime is writing, spending time my husband and my grown up kids, family, friends and my three year old grandson Jeremiah.
I have continued to work at my songs, little by little, but marketing the songs has been the challenge. So I keep writing and the songs end up copyrighted again, sent to family and friends, put on a CD. I have never given up on my dreams and hope someday to pursue songwriting full time.
I’m a mother, a sister, a true country gal who writes what she feels, writes from experience and writes from the heart of country.