Redemption's Heart

Deana Chavanne O’Hara was born in Bridgeport, NY in 1965, smack in the middle of the decade of change. Back then, just after dinosaurs quit roaming the earth, Bridgeport was a farming community between Syracuse and Rattlesnake Gulch.

Deana had no idea she was a New Yorker, and spent her childhood in ViewMaster memories; summers with her grandparents at their hardware store, clambakes and swimming in Oneida Lake, playing arcade games on the boardwalk, and being chased by boys  (after she threw things at them). Weekends during those early years were spent in the Appalachian Mountains, where her grandfather had built a log cabin.

Looking back, Deana believes she may have been in trouble more than once for being a smart aleck. Little did she know that it would turn into a career. She says,  “I have a knack for speaking first and thinking eventually.” She calls it being a UFO, or unintentionally funny orator.

Travel was a way of life for Deana, who has lived in New York, Ohio, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Michigan and Oklahoma. During her junior year in high school, Deana journeyed to Sweden as an exchange student and was privileged to attend the Nobel Awards ceremony. It was there she met the King of Sweden and promptly insulted him.

Deana was able to graduate from Redford Union High School in Michigan in 1983, despite her ability to get in trouble. She then studied computer programming and graduated from Baker Business College in 1986.

In a male dominated industry, Deana proved her worth as the first woman ever hired in Sprint’s Internal Communications Division in Chicago. She can tell you all about their warehouse and the rodents with whom she shared office space. She knows her stuff when it comes to IT and circuit design in telecommunications. She also learned how to get along with the men in that industry, which included an education in drinking, smoking and inventing new cusswords.

While in Chicago, Deana met and married Jeff O’Hara, the love of her life and the gentleman who keeps her from spilling out those cusswords. They have raised two boys, Charlie and Dillon, who are now teenagers. Deana left her corporate career to raise her boys and be the ever-vigilant soccer mom. Their family is a close-knit demonstration of love.

The OHara family attends the Lutheran Church of Our Savior in Tulsa, OK, where Deana teaches Sunday school and her husband Jeff participants in a mission start plant team. The Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod wants to plant 2,000 churches by the year 2017. Deana and Jeff were both part of a team that started out doing a Sunday Night Praise service at Our Savior and started helping with a mission start church plant  four years ago. Ablaze Church (now a satelite plant of Our Savior Lutheran Church) meets Saturday nights at Liberty Elementary School in Broken Arrow, OK.

Even though Deana no longer helps with the start, her husband still does.  Deana does facilitates Beth Moore studies, sings in the All Lutheran Church production of “The Messiah” each year, volunteers her time wherever needed and is a sought-after speaker on special needs kids, Caring for the Caretaker, and epilepsy awareness.

Oddly enough, this wealth of activity is not sufficient to keep Deana busy. No, she is also a budding comedienne and writer in the Christian Comedy Association. She calls it a miracle of God, because her early years were not filled with church activities. Her family was asked to leave a church when Deana was just a child. She believed she would never belong, but praise God, she kept trying. She says, “I love God with everything I have, and I’m learning to believe that the feeling is mutual.”

My bio was written for my by another CCA Comic, Joie Savage. You can find clean Christian Comedy at www.christiancomedyassociation.com