​The Path Taken process is about charting the different phases of our lives by telling your story to a willing listener who will map the phases as you speak. The following is a sample biography overview of Dianna Ava Stein.

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Endearing Scamp (0-7)

Dianna Stein was the second daughter born to April and Cliff Stein. It was an easy birth, just after Christmas on (dates removed for confidentiality). “Too late for Christmas but ready for the New Year,” was Cliff’s comment as they brought the healthy babe to their Melbourne home in the warmth of a ripening summer afternoon. The older child was a bit askance at her new playmate but Beatrice soon took to her duties of pushing the pram and rocking the cradle when April needed a hand. Yet the two sisters were never easy companions. Beatrice was always trying to please her parents and Dianna knew she didn’t have to try. The first septennial (0-7 years) of her life was characterized by this dichotomy for Dianna had a natural charm and easy charisma that made everyone love her and be delighted with her, while Beatrice seemed niggardly and dependent in comparison. No matter what Dianna did, however naughty she was, she always came out looking cute and all misdemeanours were easily excused. There are stories of Dianna eating all the Easter eggs and chocolates, with no care to save for a time of drought. And another of her hiding so expertly that the police were called out, to find her stowed away in a linen closet. A third sister was born when Dianna was five and a half.

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Happy Days (7-14)

In the first years of primary school Dianna was the darling of everybody’s eye. She drew easily and read quickly. She was willing to participate and delighted to be the centre of attention. Beatrice was only a year ahead at school and sometimes this lead to a sense of competition in the playground and at the dinner table when the family conversation often centred around the school day. Primary school was generally a happy time sprinkled with many holidays at relatives’ farms and fun with her younger cousins. The family was not well-off but they ate well and their parents had a sense of destiny for their daughters where a good education was the key. Dianna always had a bunch of friends and sometimes even commandeered Beatrice’s as well. At the end of primary school when Dianna was eleven they moved to an outer Melbourne suburb, far from the beach. The two girls were interested in their relatively new brick home and the large high school. Dianna missed the beach but they easily found new friends at school and at the Presbyterian Friendship Club.

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Life was pretty happy until the rebellious years of adolescence set in.

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A Beautiful Rebel (15-21)

Dianna’s stories at the family dinner table became more extraordinary as the rebellious streak took hold. She had a beauty that charmed people and a manner that commanded attention with little effort. But she was not happy at school. She loved Art, enjoyed English but found the rules and regulations tiresome and often worthy of being broken. She always had supporters, even among the teachers and was often at odds with the Head Mistress while maintaining a more cordial relationship with the Head Master. April Stein was often at school defending her daughter while attempting to keep a diplomatic line open with the hierarchy. Education was important to the Stein family. It was a path to a better life. April and Cliff were equally determined that all their daughters would be encouraged to finish secondary school and hopefully, go on to university. Dianna was bright. She won the coveted Art prize for two years running in senior school and began to show an “arty” side that surprised her parents, shocked Beatrice and delighted the youngest and her disciple, Constance. Dianna was aware of artistic trends and fashions and even while at school found the beatnik look appealing. She did well in the matriculation, while still rubbing up against regulations and tedious propriety. University was exciting and like Beatrice she travelled each day to the University of Melbourne. Both girls had taken a teaching bursary to pay their way through university although both had won Commonwealth scholarships. They were intelligent girls and Dianna was considered beautiful and innovative. The world was her oyster. But university was a new social whirl and Dianna had a good time. Where Beatrice studied diligently, Dianna found a faced-paced social set as well as the artistic rebels. She spent most of her time having a goodtime and failed subjects that she should have excelled in. By the time she was twenty-one she had been shipped off to a town in the Wimmera with a teaching certificate but subjects still to pass to gain her Bachelor of Arts degree. Eventually she finished it part-time, the same year Constance was awarded her BA.

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A Tragic Climax (22-28)

A year in the country sufficed and Dianna found her way back to Melbourne. She left home and stayed with a girlfriend in a series of interesting flats. There were many boyfriends throughout the years for Dianna was searching for excitement, artistic talent and a love of the good life. In her second year at an inner Melbourne school she found her man. Unfortunately he was married. Her parents had managed to tolerate her waywardness out of love and a desire to protect. Cliff could not accept the new beau for he left his pregnant wife to live with Dianna. He was a craftsman of note and they maintained a bohemian life in the Melbourne art and craft circles, living in the city (before it was fashionable) and collecting a group of like-minded artists in a bevvy of colleagues. Dianna was still teaching. She was a fabulous teacher and the students loved her. That charisma worked a treat and she seemed to live a charmed life. Constance adored her still and Beatrice maintained a sisterly distance. The extended family were still wrapped around her little finger. She was always ahead of the pack in fashion and outlook. She was attracted to contemporary art movements, explored psycho-drama, smoked cigars, wore extraordinary and wonderful clothes and always seemed to have amazing conversations and insights. The expected success, the obvious potential came to an end one December weekend when she went into a coma. In retrospect the onset of the brain tumour was apparent in her increasingly erratic behavior. Everyone is wiser with hindsight.

 

Lost in a Haze (29-35)

Dianna survived the coma, the treatment for the brain tumour and astonished the medical profession with her ability not only to rally, but to start to live a semi-normal life after the initial (experimental) treatment. She accompanied her lover to set up an artists’ community in the country. Dianna was still charismatic, although rather whacky after the experience. She struggled to lead a normal life while on a heavily medicated regimen. Eventually the artistic community and the relationship fell apart and she returned to Melbourne to live in a house bought by the partner before he disappeared. And so she managed for some time, taking a range of art courses in the hope of finding a new career. But she was struggling valiantly to maintain her independence and there were increasing times when she would have episodes where she would be hospitalised and one where the wrong treatment was administered and started her obvious degeneration. At thirty-five she was still able to manage the flight to visit her sister Constance who was now living in North Queensland. She was still a wonderful presence, but there was a sense of tragedy dogging her path.

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A Sad Demise (35-39)

Dianna managed a few more years of independent living, but when April visited every few months (she had moved to the country after Cliff’s death) she would realize that things were deteriorating. Constance thought she might be able to help and Dianna went to stay with her in her new home in Brisbane. Constance realized that Dianna was almost incontinent, could hardly speak, had no short-term memory and was really a danger to herself. She could not continue to live without supervision. It was a terrible reality and meant that April made the decision to admit her to a nursing home in the country town where she lived. The beautiful young woman with talent and potential was now an old, obese woman who was often vile to her careers and barely recognizable. Within months of admission, Dianna Ava Stein died in the country nursing home, a few months shy of her fortieth birthday.

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