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Cele Keeper: book signing and discussion

Presented by Brazos Bookstore at Brazos Bookstore

February 28, 2010

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Please join Brazos Bookstore for an afternoon with Houston's own Cele Keeper, who will read and sign her memoir. Celebrate the book's release with a glass of wine and toast to the remarkable life of Cele Keeper.

Her mental marbles still rolling briskly in her ninth decade, Cele felt compelled to write this memoir right now. As a self-appointed General Manager of the Universe, she thought the benefit of her 80+ years of accrued wisdom, accompanied by the poor (and yes, often dumb) choices made along the way, might suggest to others what she grudgingly came to believe: It really is never too late to grow up.

Armed with a Masters Degree in Social Work earned at age 51, a late start in the mental health field and a slight twinge of regret, that of wishing she had known herself better as a younger woman, Cele began a private practice to help others and a decade or so of group psychotherapy to help herself. This book is Cele’s telling of her journey.

"Cele Keeper’s memoir, It’s Never Too Late to Grow Up, an unflinchingly honest and irreverent history of a life well lived, is an enthralling read. Ms. Keeper never extinguishes the bright light of her candor. From the death of a beloved child to the vicissitudes of aging, she is never an object of pity. Rather, to borrow from the hilariously unforgettable quote of Meg Ryan’s eavesdropping neighbor in When Harry Met Sally, “I’ve like to have what she’s having!” -- Elizabeth B. Knight, LCSW, CGP, Immediate Past President, American Group Psychotherapy Association

"Take a very intimate journey with Cele, through a landscape of relationships and a lifetime of personal development. Her observations tickle and touch, her frank and playful words evoke discoveries made in moments small and large, and love in its many guises is always close at hand. She dares to convey important lessons learned over time in psychotherapy, the ones that open us to the other side of our stories about self and others and that ultimately free us to experience life with greater
clarity and tolerance. This is an inspiring, thought-provoking and certainly entertaining memoir." -- David Hawkins, MD, Psychiatrist in Private Practice

"It’s Never Too Late To Grow Up is a wonderful journey into the human experience through the eyes and wit of an extraordinary person. Short stories ranging from an orangutan at the zoo hurling a 'large wad of tobacco spittle' on her mother’s fur coat to wonderful verses (my favorite: 'This is It', an ode about Cele’s power struggle with her two cats!) create honest moments for self-introspection. You will close this book with a smile and I fully suspect you will learn something about yourself and your own life’s journey." -- Ira C. Colby, Professor and Dean, Graduate College of Social Work, University of Houston

"In this exceptional account, growing up is a fluid and unending process. Keeper’s tale of her journey from being tied to Mother’s Message Board to becoming an elderly butterfly is vividly and briskly told. In poetry and prose, she recounts a lifetime of love, loss, and renewal. Her’s is a wise, sad, funny, outspoken, bluntly honest memoir. From personal stories, she draws general truths about human development over a lifetime. Keeper proves beyond any reasonable doubt that it is never too late to grow up." -- Gary A. Lloyd Ph.D, Professor Emeritus, Tulane University (Social Work)

Cele S. Keeper, a Texan by birth and inclination, came to writing in her seventh decade when she began attending creative writing classes. A product of Houston Public Schools and graduate of the then Rice Institute, Cele never got very far from home. That all changed when she married Sam, her partner of sixty years, and they resolved to take in and on the world and its treasures. Both are active locally in community affairs and in the Democratic Party. At the Graduate College of Social Work at the University of Houston, they have endowed a Professorship in Peace and Social Justice which is currently held by Jody Williams, winner of the Nobel Peace prize in 1997 for her work in ridding the world of land mines. Cele has also made possible a Lectureship in Human Sexuality at the college, an elective which she taught many years earlier.

Cele describes herself as a theatre nut, an avid reader, a C-Span junkie, a sports lover (professional football, basketball, baseball and tennis) and a woman who into her eighties is attempting to learn to pace herself, maybe even slow down a bit, but there is so much to do and see and partake of, she admits this may not come to pass.