Anna.logy

October 2023 – Until I die

What does it mean to be retired? What does it mean to work? What is it about being an artist? How do you get through disability?

I’ve been an artist since I can remember. I’ve also always loved to build things. Like the King of the Enchanted Forest in the Dealing with Dragons chronicles, it feels like the magic, or art, just oozes out of me at times. Even if I reach the point where I can only move my eyes, what creativity will I still have inside me, what art, aching to get out. And how do I take my lived and worked experience and help that ache. Within me and within others.

Being a innate researcher, I appreciate documentation. Twenty years from now, if I’m still here, what will I appreciate having documented?

My goal in this disabled retired artist whatever, is to start, continue, manage, develop, and understand the documentation and the process, while experiencing the process.

One of my first websites, I titled Unconfined Undefined. I blogged about art, took pictures of food, and other random things. It eventually became the foundation from which I built my 4am Art blog, which has since thus evolved also.

That original site was built on SquareSpace because I’d used WordPress for work, it seemed complex, and I wanted to try something else. Eventually I moved the site away from SS to WP as I grew to love the idea of open source.

Now I would consider Annalogy.blog my foundational, main, or nexus site, while the others branch from there into more specific projects. Like art with 4am, farming with Leafwater, random short thoughts with Unfluence Me, questioning origins with the Humble Toothpick, politics with an A.R.T. Project, and files of memory in my MournQuill Library. There are more, and they will grow and evolve and change as well.

As all things do.

August 2017 – October 2023

Happiness Engineer (Technical & Community Support) – Former LinkedIn Bullet Points

• Provided empathetic, clear, and effective technical support to a global community of WordPress users, surpassing 20K customer and technical interactions in my tenure, through chat, email, and voice support.
• Bridged communication between developers, designers, and end-users to enhance user experience of products such as WordPress.com, WooCommerce, Jetpack, Simplenote, Cloudup, and more.
• Trained others in customer-focused communication and problem-solving.
• Found joy in bug reports and feature requests that might otherwise have disappeared into oblivion.

Sustainability ARG Co-Founder

• Founded and co-led the Sustainability Employee Resource Group, leading the company’s first carbon offset initiatives focused on data center emissions.
• Published a collaborative blog post on Earth Day 2020, (the 50th anniversary) on WordPress.com to appear on the dashboard of 102 million subscribers.

Artistic & Creative Contributions

• You Are Beautiful.
• The Art of the Perfect Drink, Mazatlán
• Sand Sculpture, Mazatlán
• Cabo San Lucas 2018
• Eva’s RootsTech 2018
• Under Surveillance Whistler 2017
• (more to come as documentation time allows)

While at Automattic, I was both developing and losing myself. As my disease was quietly advancing, I was making art, and getting into my creative style more fully while doing tech work. I began carrying watercolors and a journal everywhere I went. What I observed, I tried to record. Things I saw, I tried to paint. I tried to be fully in the experience, while creating one.

The company creed said, “I will never stop learning,” and I took that seriously. I still do.

Even now, I find myself returning to a practice: observe, record, reflect.

As my site says, “Reflections, musings, and meaning.”

Little did I know, I was helping people find their voice online — while quietly trying to hold onto mine.

Key Lessons:

• Remote work doesn’t mean invisible work — but sometimes it feels that way.
• Creativity and burnout can grow in the same soil.
• You can help thousands of people feel heard and still forget to listen to yourself.
• A watercolor journal is a form of documentation, too.
• Company culture is fragile. Trust, once lost, doesn’t reboot.
• “I will never stop learning” can be a mantra or a warning.
• Tech moves fast. Illness moves slow. Both will catch up to you.
• Being helpful is a gift. Being expected to be helpful all the time is a trap.

August 2014 – March 2017

Former LinkedIn bullet points:

• Developed and managed education programs at the CSFAC, Bemis School of Art, and theatre department, engaging over 15,000 visitors and students annually.
• Curated digital and print educational catalogs, recruited and trained instructors and educators, and streamlined class program evaluation though online feedback requests.
• Proofed, edited, and produced three class catalogs per year. Shot photos of works for and from previously un-featured artists/educators.
• Developed themed events, such as Wine and Watercolor, FAC family free day, Bemis School of Art free days, Art Jam, Museum tours for Aging populations and those with Dementia, and tours for disabled populations (i.e. visually impaired or blind).

Artistic & Creative Contributions

Art Lesson Development and Experiments

• Bleeding Tissue Paper Landscape
• Zen Tangle Pattern Landscapes
• Nightmare Before Christmas Special Kids Painting Event
• LOVE Kids Poster Art

Museum Educational Contributions

• Georgia O’Keeffe Discovery Guide
• Tactile Gallery Discovery Guide
• Line, Color, Shape Discovery Guide

Museum Artistic Contributions

• Lamenta Scriptum Winter Lights Event Tree
• Salvador Dali Clocks for Dark Matter
• Ornamental Skulls for GothGlam

Other

• Bemis School of Art Custom Gift Cards, Starry Night Inspired Watercolor, Reeds, Vase Blue, Vase Triangle, and more.
• Wine and Watercolors

I didn’t just teach classes or coordinate events — I taught the system how to recognize, remember, and support the work of art education.

From building feedback loops to creating reporting tools, I helped shift what was seen as “extra” into what became essential. Impact that used to go unnoticed got counted. Stories that used to disappear got archived. And what was once just a moment, I hope, became part of the institution’s memory.

Key lessons:

• Metrics are great — but meaning is better.
• You can’t clock in and out of caring.
• Free events aren’t free to run.
• Trust is fragile; bureaucracy is not trust’s friend.
• Teaching what should matter is possible through art, and data.

August 2012 – August 2014

Former LinkedIn Bullet Points:

• Worked seasonally in the customer service department to assist with holiday season influx. Self managed call logs, weekly reports, and development of Amazon Seller Central educational materials for customers and training for internal staff.
• Practiced and beta tested new chat based software for multi channel customer support.
• Beta tested new and in-development products. Providing detailed disability friendly feedback and blog-ready photos.
• Designed custom Google Analytics dashboards, tracking KPI metrics for SEO and SEA efforts.
• Audited and managed 40,000+ product reviews, optimizing authenticity and relevance.
• Developed, planned, and proposed a Google Ad Retargeting campaign, projecting an increase in monthly revenue by $35k.

I remember the customer service department and the rest of the office staff having what felt like a bit of a turf war. Like the Hatfields and McCoys — both sides standoffish, but no one really knew why. It had just always been that way. People from both sides eventually told me I was “nice” or “different,” even though I never changed how I acted around either.

I was one of the few to move from customer service into another department in the company. After customer service, I started out focusing on SEO and general marketing assistant work, then later moved into an analyst role. I had impressed the CMO on the marketing aptitude test with an Excel equation he hadn’t seen before — even though it solved a calculation he said he did often. (A great introduction to how often people don’t know how to look things up.)

For the test, they sat me alone in a room with a time limit and a computer. There were standard questions — typing speed, product knowledge, basic Excel — and then a few trickier ones. I wish I remembered the exact question, but I didn’t know the answer way to calculate it in Excel. I alt-tabbed, checked if the computer had internet access (it did), laughed a little, and found a formula online that seemed like it might work. I copied it into Excel, tinkered a bit, adapted it, found an answer that seemed plausible, and kept going. That ended up being the question that got the CMO’s attention. When he asked about it later, I told him I couldn’t recall exactly where I found it. And that wasn’t a lie.

Having seen that I sometimes rode a motorcycle to work, I remember him once suggesting we ride up to Woodland for lunch — somewhere along the curvy pass. I said it would take too long; I only got an hour. Really, I didn’t want to ride with someone I didn’t know, up a road I didn’t know, on a tight schedule. He gave me a look I couldn’t quite read. Maybe he understood. Or maybe CMOs didn’t have to worry about their lunch hour running out.

Later, I became disillusioned with the company. I’d pitched several ideas to generate revenue, from an online ad retargeting campaign, to modified website maintenance, all of which I volunteered to manage, and were still turned down. (Maybe I should have gone on that ride.) Eventually, the company was acquired by Target. And I don’t remember exactly how the separation happened — just that I left, and I was sad about it. The place was changing, and not in a way that felt good.

Not long after, Target shut down Chef’s Catalog entirely. Colorado Springs lost a long-standing local employer and a genuinely interesting business.

Key lessons:

• The CEO was not going to smile and chat with me.
• Having low-risk, revenue-generating ideas doesn’t mean anyone will listen.
• Looking things up is apparently a rare skill.
• Going from one department to another generally just means: mo’ money, mo’ problems.
• All good things come to an end — especially when Target buys them.

June 2012 – January 2013

I took over this yoga studio from a friend who was experiencing a mental health crisis. At the time, I was focused on my own health and didn’t want to see the studio close. We had been on friendly terms, and perhaps out of compassion, I stepped in. I purchased the business and tried to keep it afloat, though the transition was complicated by behind-the-scenes issues that undermined the handover. After about six months, I returned the studio to her and moved on to other ways of staying active.

As Josh Kaufman pointed out in his TEDx talk, it doesn’t take 10,000 hours to become proficient in something — just 20 hours of focused effort can get you surprisingly far. Somewhere between proficiency and mastery, with dedicated practice, six months can be enough to become well-versed in a new skill or role. I had already been practicing yoga intensively for my own health, so I felt confident in that space. The business side I learned on the fly — simply out of necessity, as I tried to keep things running and growing.

Taking some of the skills I’d learned in my working career thus far, I did what I could, with what I could, and learned along the way.

Former LinkedIn Bullet Points:

• Coordinated class schedules for seven instructors, balancing availability, class types, and student demand.
• Managed day-to-day studio operations, including opening and closing duties, cleanliness, and maintenance of the space.
• Served as the main point of contact for both instructors and students, addressing questions, concerns, and feedback.
• Processed memberships, payments, and registrations, ensuring accurate record-keeping and communication.
• Promoted classes and workshops through email newsletters, social media posts, and in-studio flyers to increase engagement and attendance.
• Organized and supported special events and workshops to expand the studio’s offerings and foster community involvement.
• Ensured the studio maintained a calming and inclusive environment, aligning with the principles of yoga practice.
• Increased revenue by an average of 24% per month for six months.
• Engaged community through social media, gaining 150+ new local followers, per month, during a three month initiative.

April 2010 – July 2012

I chose this job because I’d been working in the arts. From my perspective, artists and arts organizations were bad at marketing and they couldn’t afford to figure out how to get good at it. So I went and got a marketing internship to start and learn. With the plan that I would eventually bring it back to the art/non-profit world.

And eventually I did.

Directed advertising campaign strategies, managing an annual $300,000 ad budget for a rapidly growing construction industry client, increasing ad insertions, and lowering costs YOY. This is how I used to say it on LinkedIn, in actuality, it was a crazy cool learning experience for a 20 something year old to work in the metal roofing, solar, and construction industries and have to really (from my perspective) become familiar. I spent time learning about various standing seam metal roof types, non-penetrating attachments, solar panels, wind ratings, and snow loads. And that was just for S-5! (this one one client) this one little part of my job.

I dipped my toes in all sorts of unusual industries here. From paper shredding, to assisted living, big religious clients, arts organizations, home builders, dog walkers, and radio personalities. We had our own in house CMS managed by one dev who seemed to love to come hang out in my office and unwind. We did so much on paper. I stepped into years of files from the previous production manager and enjoyed spending time just reviewing the history of the firm and clients.

Managed multiple client print and digital production projects congruently. While this is true this doesn’t capture the dynamic moving nature of the work and office. The stacks of things to approve, revise, send to print, check status, follow-up on, was never ending. The files deep. The emails and calls never ending. And that was part of the fun. From websites, to signs, to newsletters, envelopes, business cards, and trade show booths. There isn’t a type of marketing product I don’t recall laying my hands or eyes on at some point.

And then one time we decided as a firm, to host a building cocktail mixer. One of the coolest buildings in Colorado Springs, there was an Old Chicago’s on the first floor. Beer and deep dish pizza. It was good, but not great. I rarely ate there. The people that owned the building, also kept an office there. I didn’t know much about them, just a tiny blonde french gal, and I’d never met her husband. Apparently he was something of a big deal or becoming one, because we somehow agreed to make the cocktail mixer an art show of her husband, Floyd D. Tunson‘s too. We picked a night, invited the whole building, and all our clients. I’d love to say it was a raging success. Maybe it was from some perspectives. But I don’t remember it being super crowded, but it was a lot of fun. Floyd showed up in a whirlwind with Florence and dropped off some photographs to display about two hours before the show. Leaned them against the walls and disappeared. I picked one up to hand it, because apparently that hadn’t been planned for by anyone. I had to laugh. No hanging wire. I don’t recall if they had the screws or hooks to attach it, but I do remember rifling through the back cabinents of the office (that I had gone through at one point bored) and found some old speaker wire. Without asking permission, and because of my experience both at Joann’s in the frame shop, the Business of Art Center, and experience early in life, I wired up the frames, measured their placements in the display area and had the whole show prepared about a half hour before anyone showed up. I’m not sure if Floyd would remember me from this event, but maybe our later times crossing paths. Two favorite moments from the event, were his look of dumbfoundment when he arrived and his pieces were all wired and hung (I think he was thinking tables and easels or something). And the conversation with the finance guy from the building, him trying to poach me from the ad firm, saying that my art degree and intellect he felt might just make me a fantastic financial advisor.

The job ended over what I recall being a moral disagreement. I wouldn’t back down or change my opinion, and I was the young employee, they had to let me go. I remember Jeff (the CEO’s) look in the meeting. A room we’d never met in before. Outside the office, but still in the building. After he said he was going to have to let me go, he gave me one more chance, and asked if I wanted to change my mind. I think I chuckled.

I remember seeing Jeff and Jill at the Renaissance festival in Larkspur years later. They looked tan and happy. I got big smiles and a compliment on my costume. I like remembering that last look.

January 2009 – August 2011

Former LinkedIn Bullet Points:

• Oversaw daily operations of studios, including printmaking, ceramics, painting, papermaking, photography, glass, and woodworking, ensuring spaces were well-maintained, functional, and inspiring for artists.
• Increased studio space utilization by 40%, developed artist engagement programs, and maintained patron databases.
• Scheduled and coordinated studio use, developiong an hourly use program, while balancing the needs of individual artists, classes, and community events.
• Managed studio budgets, supply inventory, and equipment maintenance.
• Collaborated with artists and educators to develop and implement engaging studio programming and workshops.
• Acted as a liaison between artists, students, and the broader art center team, addressing studio needs.
• Curated exhibitions, assisting with selection, layout, and installation to create visually compelling and cohesive shows.
• Handled art installation and de-installation for exhibitions, ensuring proper care and handling of artworks.
• Assisted in the gift shop with product curation, inventory management, and sales, connecting customers with locally made art and craft.
• Supported community outreach initiatives by promoting studio programs and events to build engagement and participation.

The Business of Art Center was where I learned how an art center actually breathes.

I arrived first as something like an intern or gallery aid, helping wherever there was need, learning by proximity. Over time, I became Studio Program Director, took on assistant curatorial responsibilities, and worked closely with the Executive Director. It was an education you couldn’t get from books: part logistics, part people, part intuition.

I learned how studios function not just as spaces, but as ecosystems. How printmakers, ceramicists, photographers, glass artists, and woodworkers all need different rhythms, tools, tolerances, and forms of care. How scheduling is really about conflict resolution. How budgets reflect values. How exhibitions are both storytelling and stewardship.

Most importantly, I learned that an art center isn’t defined by its walls or programs, it’s defined by the trust artists place in it. Trust that their work will be respected. Trust that the space will be held. Trust that someone is paying attention.

I was.

Key Lessons

• Art centers are living systems, not institutions. If you stop listening, they go brittle.
• Studio management is part facilities work, part diplomacy, part invisible labor.
• Space is never neutral. How it’s scheduled, lit, cleaned, and repaired shapes what gets made.
• Increasing “utilization” only works if you also increase care.
• Artists don’t need to be managed; they need to be supported, protected, and occasionally translated to administrators.
• Curating is as much about what you leave out as what you include.
• Installation is a form of respect. De-installation is where care is most visible.
• Community programming succeeds when it feels invitational, not extractive.
• The gift shop is not an afterthought; it’s a bridge between artists and the public.
• Small organizations run on people doing more than their job description—and rarely naming it.
• Learning happens fastest when you are trusted with real responsibility before you feel ready.
• The most important work often doesn’t show up in reports, but its absence is immediately felt.

January 2007 – September 2009

Former LinkedIn Bullet Points:

• Collaborated with customers to design custom framing solutions, guiding them through material, color, and style choices.
• Assembled frames with precision and care, ensuring high-quality finished products.
• Handled customer inquiries, offering solutions and personalized recommendations.
• Maintained an organized workspace and tracked inventory for the frame shop.
• Assisted with general store operations, including restocking and point-of-sale support.

January 2005 – December 2006

Learned and practiced customer service skills, alongside developing an early love of cuisine at these two places.

Brower’s was a Belgian-ish themed former paintbrush factory turned massive pub, with 60+ beers on tap, over 200 bottled beer varieties, an extensive whiskey bar, two stories, an outdoor patio, pretty amazing fries, and a fun rotating menu. I learned to love the double fried french fry (a Belgian special apparently), a spinach salad, whatever was on special, practiced Spanish with the dishwasher, smoked cigarettes for breaks, tasted beers illegally when I was underage (only if I was given one though, never sought or stolen), and kept my butt in shape carrying plates of food and trays of beer up the massive flight of stairs all shift long.

Amore Cafe was an Italian cafe that had just moved from a cozy location to a bigger fancier one and was struggling a bit to regain their audience. It had a romantic bar side with floor to ceiling windows and a breakfast side just off the kitchen. A server who bartended at Amore poached me from Brower’s saying I was being under utilized. I went from bussing tables, assisting servers, and bar backing, to serving and bartending. Learning new skills in a new environment.

September 2004 – December 2005

Customer service experience, boat/sailing experience, office management, and my first workplace discrimination.