Me

My Professional Story

Our professional stories often ask us to leave our authentic selves at the door. With that request, we lose the opportunity to experience the full dimension of each other's humanity that elicits empathy, curiosity, and connection. I don't want to leave my fully complex self at the door. I want to punch a hole in that antiquated limiting request. 
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As you'll read and stick with me—maybe even taking a peek at my resume—you'll learn that I've had a multifaceted career with a consistent thread, whether in the nonprofit world or the private sector, of diving in and striving to achieve—sometimes even succeeding in something "good".  I've thrived in environments that required creative big-picture thinking, focusing on collaborative strategies to reach solutions. I've learned to love the often-overlooked joys of the process as a goal-oriented person, and savor the details that pull a project or program together. I am passionate. Translates to: stubborn at times, outspoken, and determined. I also truly believe, by hard-learned experience, that building teams and communities of diverse and respected perspectives is the only way to go. 

My resume won’t tell you that before my brand-licensing career, I fell in love with photography and visual storytelling. I did my first photo-documentary project when participating in a nuclear arms race peace march up the coast of California. When I returned to New York, I worked for a world-recognized news photo agency (SYGMA Photo News) as an editor/researcher in the advertising/education department. I was born on the North Shore of Massachusetts and grew up in Colorado—a bit of a wild outdoor child. My family lived in a tipi for a summer on Padre Island, Texas, when I was a kid. We built and sewed it over the previous winter season. I was late to start my college education, and it took much longer than I would have liked due to some obstacles of my own making and some not—mainly money and time. I raised my daughter in Brooklyn, NY, where she grew up cloaked in a love steeped in her dad's Puerto Rican heritage and my community activism. I survived colon cancer at forty-six and have faced periods of anxiety and depression over the years. I find opening up about my mental health challenging, as it often carries a stigma. Surviving cancer makes you a hero. Mental health challenges can be filled with shame. Both our mental and physical health are our whole-body story, and we can share all of it with grace and courage.