Hi, I’m Jo

I believe that trust is something that is collaboratively built. Here are some things I promise to do to establish our trust:

• follow through

• be honest with you

• stick with my values

• maintain my own boundaries and respect yours

I will not be perfect because I am a human, but I promise you I will try my best.

Right! Okay, we’re going resume. If you want my literal resume just email me and I’ll send it to you.

• Currently enrolled in a Master’s of Divinity program at Iliff Theological School focused on embodied spirituality and training to become a movement chaplain

• I’ve worked as a community organizer in formal and informal settings for a lifetime? 10+ years? Depends on when you start. I have worked state-wide and nationally in both Texas and Colorado with people of all types of backgrounds and have been trained in trauma-informed and culturally responsive approaches

• Over 10 years of experience as a non-profit professional focused on storytelling, narrative change, and organizational change

• Over 5 years experience as a tarot reader

• My undergraduate degree was in Anthropology where I was trained in both ethnography and autoethnography. Active listening, critiquing systems of oppression, and holding the cognitive dissonance of being a person who is both harmed and a perpetuator of harm is the foundation of everything I do

• I am a caregiver and someone who needs caregiving as a disabled mom. I have worked as a post-partum doula and supported end-of-life and elder care

• I plan to soon pursue education to become a Death Doula

• I’m sure there’s other things so let me know if you have any questions!

I am really awful at describing myself, so I’d love to meet you and we can introduce ourselves the old fashioned way. But since you asked, here are some things that are core to who I am:

• I was born and raised in Texas and everything I learned about food, organizing, and community is rooted in the South. I live in Colorado now, where my mom is from, and my relationship to where I live is complicated.

• I am queer and a later-in-life lesbian. I am also genderqueer and my relationship to gender is funky and fluid. I see my queerness as choosing to live life deliciously.

• I am a mom! My kid is rad af. Motherhood is a radicalizing identity for me and something that is simultaneously deeply personal and political.

• I am disabled with a dynamic disability. My brain and body work in ways that have at times felt confounding and conflicting. I work every day to attempt to embody Alice Wong’s vision of disabled people as oracles.

• I am a white person of Irish decent who has spent a lot of time interrogating whiteness and practicing anti-racism personally and professionally. For this space this means I won’t be the best fit to work with everyone (and that’s okay!) and I’d also love to work with white people interested in grieving the particular ways white supremacy rips us from our humanity. It also means I like yacht rock.

• I am a crafter. I like the term more than artist because a lot of what I love to create is rooted in the practical and corporeal, but I also wonder how much of that is imposter syndrome. I primarily knit but I also sew, quilt, paint, garden, crochet, work with clay, and pick up new skills whenever I can. This year I’m hoping to try out tambour embroidery and English bobbin lace.