By Joan Cusick

Author Anne Da Vigo is rewriting the rules of what it means to be an older adult.

As a young journalist, she started her career at a small newspaper in Madera in the San Joaquin Valley. “There were two of us — both women, both covering the police in a small town. But when I moved up from that small paper to a larger paper in Bakersfield, I was only the second woman they’d hired since World War II. So in that situation, I was sort of a trendsetter as far as covering government and being out covering the city.”

She eventually moved on to the Sacramento Union, then to the state legislature as communications director and press secretary and finally to the California Highway Patrol as a public information officer. “So that’s my background — a lot of writing.”

Even after her official retirement, Da Vigo is still writing. Her third self-published thriller is due out at the end of this year. And, in the meantime, she stays active with weekly tap dance lessons and daily walks.

From journalism, it’s a pretty broad leap to tap dancing. When did you get involved in dance? 

I had taken ballet when I was growing up … and I met my husband country dancing, but after I retired, I saw an article about somebody who was taking tap classes. So I called up the lady who ran the tap class, and she agreed to take me as a student. She had a small group in her house. I got good enough so I could tap with the group that she had, and we eventually started a performance group.

That group, which was called Rhythm and Shoes, did 99 performances around Sacramento before people aged out. We disbanded about seven, eight years ago, but we danced all over the place — at the [California] State Fair, for senior citizens groups. One of the funniest performances we ever did was for a senior citizens group who met at the Elks Club in Cameron Park, I think, for a Christmas event. There was no place for us to change our clothes, so we changed our clothes in the bar and in the wine storage room in the back. Now, when we talk about our years dancing, that’s one of the ones we always go back to and laugh a lot about. 

That’s the tap dancing side of your life. Then there’s the writing. I imagine the writing takes a whole lot more time out of your schedule.

It does, yeah. I wrote my first novel — which was a women’s mainstream novel that never got published — while I was still working. I would get up several days a week at 4 o’clock or 5 o’clock and write for a couple hours before I got dressed to go to work. And I finished that while I was still working. But I was never able to sell it. And it’s still in my computer. It’s a good novel. 

Then after I retired, I started on my first book, which is called “Thread of Gold.” The idea for that thriller was taken from a newspaper clipping from The New York Times that my mother sent me back in the ’90s when she was still alive. It was about the deaths of two men and three cows in this small town where she grew up in upstate New York, in the Finger Lakes. At the time I thought, “Oh my gosh, this is a great story,” so I put it in my file. Finally, almost 15 years later when I retired, I used that as my inspiration. … I included a lot of family history, folding in that my grandfather owned a general store there, and my mom grew up there as well, and my grandmother was a school teacher in a one-room schoolhouse. … Then I went back and did some bookstore tours when I released that book. It was a lot of fun. I had a really good time with it. 

My second book, “Bakersfield Boys Club,” was inspired by a real case that I covered in Bakersfield in the late 1970s. It was the first trial in a case that came to be known as the Lords of Bakersfield — a group of powerful men who were abusing young people. … Many of the people I wrote about or who were involved in the Lords of Bakersfield cases were people I knew, including the man who hired me at The Bakersfield Californian.

Then there’s my new book, “Night Flight.” I’m very excited about it, actually. I grew up in Lakewood, Colorado, and in 1955, a bomber blew up a United Airlines flight out of Denver’s Stapleton Airfield. Called Mainliner Denver [United Airlines flight 629], it was the first airplane sabotage event in the U.S.and one of the most horrendous crimes of the 20th century. The perpetrator of that crime was arrested within a couple of weeks. He and his family went to my church. I didn’t know them, but the minister at my church was very involved with the family at that point, counseling the wife of the bomber and also visiting the bomber when he was in prison, before his execution. That minister was also the man who baptized me when I was about 9 years old. 

This third book will launch in early February. I’ll be doing a series of events for “Night Flight,” including a launch party on Feb. 8 at Sierra 2 Center for the Arts and Community. I’m also beginning to schedule appearances at book clubs, bookstores and writers conferences.

I have finished the first draft of another thriller. But when I got started on this one, I was so excited about it that the other one’s still sitting in my computer. I’ll edit that one after “Night Flight” is launched.

What’s your writing process like? 

I write almost every day, about two or three hours a day. I can’t really sit there longer than that. Walking always helps me work out problems that I see coming up or that I’m having. And I walk around my neighborhood almost every day, two or three miles. It’s a lovely neighborhood and people are very friendly. And it’s just a delight to have a place with good sidewalks and beautiful trees and friendly people. It really is wonderful.

What other things do you love to do?

I’m in several groups. I have the Monday night writers group, which I started years and years ago. And then I have my Thursday night critique group. And then I have a tap; a group of tap people and some of those people from my old tap performing groups still get together. I have a group that meets on Friday and we walk out on the bike trail. And I have a women’s support group. It’s not like they’re super organized groups. We just get together and do fun things like walking and tapping and writing or supporting each other.

The other thing is that my husband and I love to go out and find a place to have dinner. He has his own business and his own things that he does. Between us we have seven children and eight grandchildren, and all of our children are married. So keeping up with them is always a lot of fun.

I think there are a lot of stereotypes around being grandparents. Do you feel any need to chart your own path when it comes to being a grandmother? 

My husband says — and I say, too — that when you retire, the first thing you should do is to have a plan. Taking care of your grandchildren is not a plan because your grandchildren grow up, they go to high school and college. They are out doing their own things. Being in contact with your grandchildren is wonderful, but you can’t build a retirement life around grandchildren because they are going off to start their own lives. … You have to figure out who you are and what your life is going to be about.

So if there were one stereotype that you could just wipe away, what would it be? 

I notice that older people are perceived as not being smart. I think you have to disabuse people of that really quickly.

It used to be when you were 70, you were old. But you’re not now. One of my best editors was 89 when he edited my first book. He used to be a newspaper editor, and … he had an eye like you cannot believe. There are all these people out there with huge talents and huge things to offer.

If you could give advice to the huge number of baby boomers who are turning 70 this year, what’s your best advice about turning 70? 

Have a plan. What is it you love to do? Now’s your chance. … I mean, there’s just this whole world of things out there. Just choose something you love.

This story was funded by the City of Sacramento’s Arts and Creative Economy Journalism Grant to Solving Sacramento. Following our journalism code of ethics and protocols, the city had no editorial influence over this story and no city official reviewed this story before it was published. Our partners include California Groundbreakers, Capital Public Radio, Outword, Russian America Media, Sacramento Business Journal, Sacramento News & Review, Sacramento Observer and Univision 19. Sign up for our “Sac Art Pulse” newsletter here.