Well… today the little man played in the championships for 1st and 2nd. It was such a close game. There were several fouls and several injuries. I think my every nerve was racked until the last second of the game. My number 21 played his heart out. It was a fight. He really tried in this game. The Coyotes took 2nd after they were kicked into overtime and then lost by 2 points in the final minute.
“You become a champion by fighting one more round. When things are tough, you fight one more round.” ~~James J. Corbett
Last week I went to a conference in Austin, Texas to make a presentation and accept a leadership award. I learned so much during the course of the week and networked with many people. I visited the beautiful capitol and the Texas State Archives while I was there.
Austin is an interesting city to say the least, and I can see why they have the saying “keep Austin weird.” After 5 was always a trippy adventure… from the crazy street people, to the bat bridge, to good eats. I didn’t take photos of the weird stuff though!
Amongst a gazillion bars, there was one real gym. It was a Gold’s. I like having a few drinks occasionally, but a gazillion bars is a far cry from my cup of tea! In my off work/downtime, I had the most fun on Lake Travis on my last day there.
•••Amazing Stonework Here•••
•••TX Archives actually had up a NM Archives Poster and a View of the Capitol from my Hotel Room Window•••
•••D Loooooved This Car and Lady Bird Lake•••
•••Me and D on the Bat Bridge on Congress Street and Our Ride in an Electric Car•••
Highlight: Hangin’ with two of my favorite woman of the law with a love of writing. It’s great to seeBetsy and Sana every year at the Tony Hillerman Writers Conference.
~Betsy, Sana & Felicia~
Highlight:CB McKenzie (winner of the 2013 Hillerman Prize for best 1st mystery) giving me a free copy of his book with an autograph which read… “To our favorite person, Felicia.” Also~ seeing the oversized poster I designed for him up in the bookstore. He is a really nice, personable, funny man with a Ph.D. I’m sure it will be great working with him!
~CB McKenzie Stuff~
Highlight: Hangin’ with my friend and fellow team member with a Ph.D.,Susan Waterman. She is an editor by profession. Susan is really in tune with nature and is such a special woman. I have enjoyed working with her over the past few years.
~Susan & Felicia~
Highlight: Chatting withJohn Fortunato before I knew he would be crowned the 2014 Hillerman Prize winner for best 1st mystery. Then…watching him get crowned while discovering he is also an FBI agent who formerly worked for the Gallup “Resident Agency.”
~John Fortunato (2014 Hillerman Prize Winner)~
Highlight: Sitting on a table at the keynote dinner with three amazingly smart women. The keynote speakers were New York Times best-selling authorJohn Sandford and the infamous “father of Rambo” and thriller writerDavid Morrell. The women were impressive though. I shared a table with a mathematician (with NASA), a former news producer (for channel 7 in Los Angeles), and a former software engineer (for Los Alamos National Laboratory). All of them are writers.
~John Sandford & David Morrell~
Highlight: Realizing (yet agggggain) the power and value of what I was a part of for the last few days. I work for two amazing women...Anne Hillerman and Jean Schaumberg. They are wonderful people. This is the full-page ad I designed for them because they deserved to be in the spotlight on the 10th anniversary of a great conference.
I was happy and honored to get an email from Anne Ackerson today. She is the Executive Director of the Council of State Archivists (CoSA).
Her letter read… “Dear Felicia, On behalf of the CoSA Awards Program Committee and the Board of Directors, I am pleased to inform you that you have been chosen to receive a CoSA-Ancestry.com Leadership Award. You will receive an award check of $1000 toward professional development to be completed between November 1, 2014 and October 31, 2015.
As per the terms of the award, you will be expected to attend the annual CoSA Work Session in Austin, TX next summer to make a short presentation about how you used the award and what impact it is making on your career. Reimbursement for your registration and travel to the CoSA Annual Meeting will be underwritten by CoSA and Ancestry.com up to $1500.
The award check in the amount of $1000 will be mailed to you before the end of this month.
We thank you for your interest in this new program and we know that you will put the award to excellent use. Congratulations!
Best, Anne”
I just realized CoSA has a WordPress site and started following as of five minutes ago. A big thank you to my director and agency head for nominating me for the award. I’ll start researching to see how I would like to spend this money when I come back from San Diego. Looks like I’m headed to Austin in 2015 as well.
Our Carcanet Press Email Preservation Project has been selected as one of the finalists for the prestigious Digital Preservation Awards. Administered by the Digital Preservation Coalition, the awards celebrate people and organisations across the world who have made significant and innovative contributions to ensuring our digital memory is accessible tomorrow. We have been shortlisted for the Award for Safeguarding the Digital Legacy, which rewards projects focused on protecting ‘at-risk’ digital objects.
In our case, these objects were the emails of staff at premier poetry publishing house, Carcanet Press, which were languishing on hard drives and local networks at the Carcanet office. Carcanet’s hard copy archive – held at the Library – fills around 1,300 boxes, but the correspondence files have been dwindling in size with the shift to digital communication. Our project has rescued over 200,000 emails and 65,000 attachments, and we will be adding to this huge archive on an…
Last night I zipped off a draft of the Hillerman Prize flyer I designed to promote the 2014 award. Once Anne and Jean clear my draft, I will share the final design. For all you writers out there…take a shot! It’s worth it!! You are looking at 10gz plus all the fringe benefits! One day I will have an entry.
These two women I work for are really good to me. Anne and Jean own Wordharvest and run the Tony Hillerman Writers Conference. They are a pleasure to know. I saved the nice card they gave me after I managed the conference bookstore last year. I will save it in my personal archive.
Today I was honored to be nominated for an award by a woman I have a very deep respect for. I have to credit this lovely powerhouse of a woman for introducing me to WordPress. If it weren’t for her, it is possible that I may have never regained a creative outlet for my writing, art, thoughts, and fitness rants.
I have thousands of followers, but out of all those virtual souls, there are only a few I can say I have had the pleasure to know in the real world. After all, the virtual world matters not if you are unable to connect with people in a deeper way. I have know Dr. Sandra K. Mathews-Benham for many years. She breaks one of the stereotypes I hate, which makes her that much more awesome!
Sandra is an intellectually blessed woman. She is an accomplished Professor of History with Nebraska Wesleyan University, but she adores New Mexico. This inspiring woman teaches Western Women’s History, American Indian History, and Revolutions in Latin America and still makes time for fitness! I love it!!! Her fitness site is titled A Promise to Dad and her tagline reads “you don’t have anything if you don’t have your health.”
It is funny that the doc wasn’t sure if I would “bother” with her award! How can I not accept an award from my fit and intellectual friend who actually introduced me to WordPress? In 2013, Sandra has logged 43+ miles swimming, 501+ miles cycling, 221+ miles running, and 10+ hours of strength training and yoga. Unbelievable!! She is awesome indeed! As a knowledgeable gym rat, Sandra blows the “you can’t be a fit nerd” stereotype right out the water~ literally!
I gladly accept being acknowledged by a woman who makes positive contributions to this world. She has also been know to make me smile and laugh. Thank you doc. I will wear my Blog of the Year badge from you with pride!
Today Robert Pinsky published a great article about poetry on the Big Think (a site I really like). It is National Poetry Month and this piece by the 39th Poet Laureate of the United States is so thought provoking. I do know some people who don’t like poetry even though this article says Americans are just stereotyped with regard to that.
I actually think it is essential for humans to explore and develop poetic expression and understanding. Being matter-of-fact or literal all the time can simply destroy beautiful souls. As a deep and intricate being- I enjoy indulging my innermost feelings. My poetry is very fluid. It can be about something, somebody, nothing, and nobody all at the same time.
Pinsky’s article is titled Poetry Is Not an Ornament. It’s at the Center of Our Being. Yes– indeed it is. Those things which capture the heart of a poet are often riveted with complexity, rendering traditional forms of communication useless. The complex feelings of humans are often represented best rhythmically.
This afternoon a US Poet Laureate said it better than many could. Following are some of the quotes which stood out to me in Pinsky’s article about “the value of using poetic language in everyday life.”
“…the poem is a challenge to say something smart.”
“…you have to understand that a poem is a work of art and its purpose is not to make you feel puzzled…”
“…finding something that you would like to say aloud is, I think it’s the core of human intelligence, it’s quite fundamental.”
“How does poetry or the act of writing a poem or speaking a poem help us to distill our experiences in a unique way that other forms of communication don’t allow for?”
“I think art is not an ornament or refinement at the fringes of human intelligence. I think it’s at the center. It’s at the core.”
“…that hunger that ability that craving for art in relation to memory is right at the center of us. And poetry, we use our own body to make it. There is no fiddle, there is no paint, it’s the air that comes out of your body shaped in ways that have evolved and that are controlled by our brain.”
Awesome!! I love this man. I got a good idea from that last quote. Read the full article if you get a chance. He also talks about the “Favorite Poem Project,” and nurturing poetic creativity in children.
~~•~~•~~•~~•~~•~~•~~•~~ Flattered to see over a dozen
hits referred to my web site today
through the web site of an author
named Tricia Fields. Ms. Fields
was the winner of the *2010
Hillerman Award for Best First
Mystery.* She also has a new
book set for release on the 5th
of March.
Check out her site for details!
~~•~~•~~•~~•~~•~~•~~•~~
So here is my breakdown of the 55th Annual Grammy Awards~ or what I feel was worth a mention anyhow. The awards were hosted by LL, who is also a winner of two Grammy Awards. He opened with a shot out to Beyonce, Carrie Underwood, Adele and Rihanna (who looked super smokin’ with her hair down and with red lips).
I’m not sure how to feel about Taylor Swift being the opening act. I don’t think she pulled off the Mad Hatter with that “we are never ever getting back together” noise. She has way better songs on her new album Red. She also needs to learn how to move with the music~ and was lookin’ rather stiff. Only Adele can stand up there with just her flawless voice and pull that off.
JLo and Pitbull gave out the first award of the night lookin’ super hot with lots of leg and swag. The award was for “Best Pop Solo Performance” and it went to the lovely Adele. She is simply awesome!
Dierks Bentley and Miranda Lambert (with her hot pink mic) did a good job on two songs. Her dress was pretty. She seemed a little nervous or something? I gotta love the acoustic guitar that Bentley stroked.
Miguel and Wiz Khalifa were~ just wow. They didn’t get enough time on stage! I loved the completely red set with black and white outfits. “Adorn” is one of my favs from Miguel, though I did post the other night that I wished he would have performed “Hard Way.” They presented a country award afterward. Ha??
Faith and Tim are a straight sexy couple. I just can’t believe the award they presented didn’t go to Miguel? Really?
Mumford & Sons did such a good job. I have been listening to them a lot lately. Now that is what you call jammin’ on a banjo!
I am so excited that Justin Timberlake is making a comeback. I luv JT, but I gotta say that “Suit & Tie” does not tickle me just the right way. Unfortunately~ a special intro from Beyonce and the guest feature by JayZ did not help in the least bit! Hopefully he finds his mojo soon cuz I do miss him.
Kelly Rowland had on a super hot black dress. It was my favorite dress of the night! Her arms were buff making it look even better! Beyonce who?? Kelly and NAS presented an award to Frank Ocean who so deserves it! Still~ I couldn’t help but feel that Miguel should have taken that award!
Do I even need to comment on Maroon 5? Adam is always awesome~ plus he hired Minka Kelly (go Albuquerque~ NM) to be in the 2012 “One More Night” music video (which is a hot video). Then the M5 performance had to be ruined by Alicia Keys.
Hands, hands, hands down…. In my book, the best performance of the night went to Rihanna and Mikky Ekko. “Stay” is just *such* a great song. Rihanna looked so beautiful in a plain black dress with a hint of red. That song reminds me of a friend. How appropriate that she said the new music video for “Stay” will be released tomorrow (on the 11th). The woman is very sentimental when she sings that one. I can feel her soul in that song.
Did JayZ really dis on The Dream’s hat instead of thanking anybody when he won a Grammy for “No Church in the Wild” ~ Really? Talk about rude. What a schmuck!!
The Bob Marley tribute with Bruno Mars, Rihanna, Sting and the Marleys was cool. A bit of Marley takes me back.
Carrie Underwood’s butterfly light effects were interesting.
I loved the guest appearance by Prince! He came out to present the Grammy for “Record of the Year.” I wish Prince would make a comeback. He presented the award to Gotye and Kimbra. I thought Frank Ocean would take that one.
The finale was much better than the intro. It featured LL Cool J, Chuck D and Travis Barker on the drums. For being older, LL still rocks some big ole gunz.
The 55th Annual Grammy Awards were good this year. For the first time in a few years, I was able to watch the long show from start to finish. I stayed entertained throughout the night. I still say that Rihanna gets my vote for the most heartfelt and beautiful performance of the evening.
A special thanks for those who decided to see My Voyage Through Time fit for Blog of the Year. I do appreciate that. Thanks to Enchanted Solitaire (Morrighan), Merio, Writersfield (T~Sizzles), The Arkside of Thought (Sahm), and Fictional Machines (J.E. Lattimer). You are all amazing and talented people!
Wow~~ It was about due time I officially thanked the people who have contributed to the success of my site.
From August 18, 2012 thru January 15, 2013 I had received 14 awards from my peers and I want to take the time to thank all of you. Unfortunately I do not have it in me to do all of things I am supposed to do for each acceptance, still I want to say thanks. I appreciate each and every one of you thinking of this site when you had so many wonderful sites to choose from.
It seems like just yesterday… I felt like a deer paralyzed by an unrelenting glare from the headlights of my future. Now I am quickly approaching two decades of service to my home state and her citizens.
This week we had an agency staff meeting. Toward the end of the meeting, several people were acknowledged for their service to the state. The years have been recognized in increments of five. This means that only 10 years of service to my agency have been accounted for. However, I think it has really been 13 years.
During the early part of my government career, I worked for: a Governor; a State Treasurer; a State Librarian; and the Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department as a Public Information Officer. Some of the positions were not permanent, but I learned something unique from each position I had.
The larger part of my career has been with the New Mexico State Records Center and Archives. I have been blessed to be employed by an agency that has been good to me. In my time with the agency, I have held five positions across two divisions and three bureaus. Each of these positions has touched part of what is referred to as the “life cycle of a record.”
I started with my agency in the late 1990s. My first position was in the Records Warehouse~ which is where active records are stored. I learned so many interesting things in that position. I am a Technical Writer and so my next goal was to qualify for a Management Analyst position.
I worked as an analyst for a couple of years. There I researched and wrote records retention and disposition schedules. These schedules are codified. Back then my old director called archives (where I am now) “the fluff.” I believe I was a natural fit for the archives as I have an undying love of history, collecting and New Mexican culture.
I have been with my current division for over a decade. It has been a great journey. Everyday I still learn something new. Everyday I meet new people. The final leg of my career has birthed a caring archivist. I genuinely love my profession and my state. It has been my honor to preserve history which will benefit generations to come.
~Promotional flyer for the Hillerman Prize~ Designed by Felicia Lujan
Anne Hillerman was recently featured in a great article in the Albuquerque Journal. The article was written by Kathaleen Roberts and was titled Leaphorn and Chee Together Again. Anne Hillerman is a smart, sweet, and talented woman who is continuing a writing tradition which was started by her father Tony Hillerman. Her late father was a New York Times best-selling author of an 18-book series of mysteries featuring the characters Leaphorn and Chee. PBS has called Leaphorn and Chee “a classic crime-fighting duo.” In the fall of 2013, HarperCollins will publish Anne’s newest book and a continuation of this Hillerman mystery series. Her book will be titled “Spider Woman’s Daughter.” In the first quarter of 2013, I plan to sit down with Anne to interview her about the release of her upcoming book. She has agreed to a feature piece for my site, and I am excited for the opportunity to interview her.
I was honored to be asked by Anne to design a flyer to promote the Tony Hillerman Prize competition. The flyer was circulated at the New Mexico Book Association Holiday Party on December 6, 2012. The competition is sponsored by Wordharvest (LLC) and is co-sponsored by St. Martin’s Press (LLC). This prize is awarded annually for best first mystery set in the Southwest. The winner receives a contract with St. Martin’s Press for publication of the novel and $10,000. The Hillerman Prize is named after New Mexico’s best known mystery author, Tony Hillerman. It is open to any writer who has never been the author of a published mystery. The prize comes with awesome acknowledgment from a body of professional and amateur writers. I myself aspire to submit something someday. The book submission must include murder or another serious crime or crimes, which must be at the heart of the story. There also must be an emphasis on the solution rather than the details of the crime.
Lover of REALNESS... smart people with large brains... strong people with human weakness... all things divine and magical... and anything that makes my heart beat, my mind race, my body hurt, or my soul ache.
My Voyage Through Time 
SPEAK ON IT