Eileen Tobin's last published story was in 1943, when she was a student in a writing seminar taught by the late novelist Millen Brand. In 1994, Tobin began writing again under the tutelage of another novelist, Mary Gordon, who, while fulfilling a public service condition of a grant from the Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Fund, conducted a writing workshop for elders in New York City's Upper West Side. "Goodbye, Tinker Bell, Hello, God" is from Tobin's memoir in progress, Bog Oak. She is eighty-one years old.