Category: writer

I’ve Got A Secret

In one of those weird things that sticks with you over the years…

I remember that some dear friends of our family always subscribed to New Mexico Magazine. We’d go visit their beautiful adobe home in the Valley, and when the adult conversation would bore me, I’d pick up that magazine and flip through the pages.

New Mexico Magazine gave me a view on my home state that was much different than what I knew. I’d stare and stare at those amazing full color photographs of Native American jewelry, or locations around the state, or blue sky and clouds.

It was like my New Mexico, only better. I used to devour that magazine cover to cover.

When I became an adult, I started subscribing to New Mexico Magazine for myself. After my move to California, the magazine helped me get through pangs of homesickness. I’d dog ear pages of photos and articles that made me happy.

New Mexico Magazine has been a fixture in my life as long as I can remember. Today, I know something that the kid sitting on the floor in a beautiful adobe home in the Valley didn’t know.

I’ve been keeping a secret. I didn’t want to say too much in case it didn’t work out.

Now the secret can be told. I have permission to share my Very Big News:

I wrote three articles that have been accepted for publication in New Mexico Magazine.

Let me just pause here before I pass out.

Ok, I’m back.

The first article is slated for the June issue. Due out soon!

The other two are planned for the September/October timeframe. Since the magazine is undergoing some changes to the editorial staff, it’s a bit up in the air. I hope to know more soon.

All gratitude to Associate Editor Ashley Biggers (@ambiggers on Twitter) for opening the conversation and working with me through this process. She has a talent for developing writers, and I’m grateful for her patience.

I’m already working on a couple more ideas for upcoming articles. There is so much to know and explore about New Mexico that I’m excited to share.

This is a pretty big honor for a little girl from New Mexico.

Join me now in an epic rendition of the Happy Dance!






To properly celebrate, I wore my Fat Babies to work today. New Mexico in da hoouuuse!


Image from Yippee Farms


My Favorite Wayback Machine Line of the Day

“No matter where I am in the world, in such disparate places as Sunset Boulevard, the canyons of Manhattan, an old mine tunnel in the Black Range above Hillsboro in southwestern New Mexico, or the limitless sagebrush desert norths beyond the Rio Grande gorge of Taos, I think of the land and some incident that happened on the malpais rocks and soil of Hi-Lo.

Like the gravity filled land, the thoughts and inspiration are perpetual.”

— Max Evans, in his book Hi Lo Country: Under the One-Eyed Sky


Just re-reading my February issue of New Mexico Magazine…the “Best Ever Books Issue”. It’s a dandy.

If you aren’t reading New Mexico Magazine, you oughta be.




AP Photo/Jake Schoellkopf

I bet I think this blog post is about me….

On this happy, happy oh-holy-sheet-that-was-a-long-week Friday, I’m going to ask you, my dear readers, to head on over to a different blog.

Check out my buddy Alan Macfarlane’s blog Air Balls and Air Guitar.

He’s posted his next in a series of interviews called “Who are the people in your Twitterhood?”

This week, Alan and I sit down for a chat. His questions are great. My answers are long winded.

That tends to happen when two writers get together: A preponderance of words.

And by that I mean, I had A LOT of fun.

Thank you Alan! And have a great weekend.


Brevity Is Not My Middle Name

(Sometimes the pump just needs priming. After writing about having nothing to say, it turns out I actually did have something to say today. It was just hiding. Here’s a second post for the day.)

A few weeks ago, we had a manager’s meeting here at work. This is a once a quarter affair where we meet, eat pastry, and talk about our plans for the department over the next three months.

Part of these meetings is also a discussion about how we, the management team, can improve ourselves and be better leaders for our team.

This quarter’s growth topic in support of that goal was about our use of words.

A senior member of our staff held aloft the cap from a water bottle, and told us the goal was to “use a capful, don’t pour out the whole bottle.”

He told us to shorten the bullets on our PowerPoint presentations.

He told us to “speak in conclusions” in our emails.

He told us to always be aware of how many words we’re using and then trim it back.

Ironically, it took him over half an hour to pass along this message.

I deeply considered throwing the cap from my own water bottle at him.

But I didn’t.

Ahem.

Look, dear readers, you’ve been with me for over three years, and 1,000 posts which amounts to approximately half a million words.

Do you *really* think I can “use a capful” when I write?

People, please.

To paraphrase The Dude, I’m not really into that whole brevity thing.

I’m a writer! I’m a creative! I pass words like currency through my life. My husband and my best friend, the closest people to me, both have kick ass vocabularies! If you’re gonna run with me, you gotta love the use of words and language and be willing to endure my penchant for storytelling the whole damn six pack, not just the capful.

No, I say! No! I reject the capful and dive headfirst into the ocean of words, swim around nekkid, get the words all soaked into my skin and then I’ll use a few more adverbs just to make it more, erm, wordly!

Damnit! Asking me to ratchet back the words is like tying Rodin‘s hands behind his back and asking him to craft a masterpiece with his toes.*

Ain’t gonna happen.**

* Look who is comparing herself to Rodin. That’s a bit audacious, innit?

** That said…I’m trying. Well, trying at work anyway. Be warned, all the words I have to cut out of my days at work are so totally going to show up here.

Cartoon from Toothpaste for Dinner