Why me?

Just before Christmas I received an email from the Rootstech organizers that said "Congratulations! Your RootsTech presentation “The Genealogist’s Gadget Bag “ has been identified as a session that we would like to stream live online on the RootsTech web site for those who are not able to physically attend the conference."

Of course I agreed, I was honoured and delighted. What a this was coup for Australia to have an ordinary citizen in this lineup! I informed my co-presenters,Marie and AC,  completed the Familysearch "Release to Record"  form, and asked my co-presenters to do the same. As the Rootstech people asked us to keep this secret we did. 

As the weeks went by and there was no more mention of livestreaming from the organizers I thought that our session had probably not made the cut. After all there is a huge group of very competent and inspiring speakers on the Rootstech program. Why would they select for livestreaming a little granny from downunder with a strange turn of phrase and an even stranger accent?

Then a couple of weeks ago Randy Seaver wrote in a blog post "While the live-streamed sessions have not been positively identified, I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that they will all be shown from Hall 1 (because that is where the Keynotes will be, and the live-streamed sessions were shown from Hall 1 the past two years)."  This put the cat amongst the pigeons as I knew that my session was to be in Hall 1 and if Randy was right in his predictions I was about to be thrown on the world's geneastage.  I have been nervously awaiting an announcement from Rootstech to see if I had really made the cut. 

Sometime after 11:00 pm (Australian time) last night the sessions to be livestreamed were announced on the Familysearch blog. I had a quick look at Facebook before I went to bed and there was a message from Spanish blogger, Sonia Meza, telling me that my session was to be livestreamed. When I woke this morning I found the Familysearch post and confirmed that my session will be livestreamed at 3:00pm (US Mountain Standard Time). As I read this post I felt my palms getting sweaty and a swarm of butterflies breeding in my stomach. The list of people to be livestreamed is rather impressive; those who are not able to make the real Rootstech Conference will be able to have a wonderful learning experience wherever they are.

I have trouble with timezones but I think that this will mean I will be on air on Friday 22 March at 8:00 am Sydney time. I used the Time and Date converter at http://www.timeanddate.com  to confirm this. You may wish to check it for your location. 

How will you access the livestream? The Familysearch blog post says "NOTE: A WEBCAST WINDOW WILL BE AVAILABLE ON THE WEBSITE LISTED TO WATCH THE LIVE STREAM STARTING THURSDAY, THE OPENING DAY OF THE ROOTSTECH CONFERENCE." When I have more details I will share them on this blog.

So there you have it. I will be presenting to the world from Salt Lake City in one week's time. Now I had better turn my attention to packing my bag and organising my travel documents.

As I sit here feeling proud, honoured, nervous and stunned I am left wondering. 

WHY ME?