“People always clap for the wrong things.”
― J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
There are awards and there are awards. As an artist, writer and community activist, various recognitions have come my way and I have always been grateful for them.
I have also been on the other end of giving honor. I remember with joy judging an empanada contest in Rock Springs, Wyoming that my sister, Faride Chávez Conway, set up as part of a Business and Professional Women’s conference. I have judged a children’s Halloween costume contest in Española, New Mexico and Mr. and Ms. Gay Houston. I’ve given Writer-to-Writer certificates to authors age three to age twelve during the recent Southwest Festival of the Written Word in Silver City and loved every minute of it.
I’ve also been to Washington, D.C. to receive the National Hispanic Heritage Award at the Kennedy Center wearing the wrong shoes. It was a wonderful event but I wish someone had told me I would have to go around the back of the building all the way around to the front to get back to my seat. I simply had the worst shoes. I never wore them again they were so uncomfortable. I’d spent a month looking for the dress I wore that night. It was a long elegant white beaded number and later I remembered invaluable womanly advice of old, “Never Wear White in the Winter.” It’s true; I was the only person wearing white in the entire auditorium.
I have in my possession large and small clay plates, strangely shaped glass, crystal spheres and various cylindrical objects that look like alien weaponry that represent different awards. When my father was dying in the hospital I went to his bedside holding a clay Yucca, an award that lost more than a few branches that day of confusion and sadness. I remember hearing that Molly Ivins used her awards as trivets and placed them on the table to protect hot food from touching the table’s surface. It’s a glorious and wild idea but I would never use any award, paper, metal, clay, glass or plastic for anything other than for what it was meant: to view, to remember and to be appreciated. Awards mean something so deep for me that no matter what it was that was being awarded, it mattered to me.
The Madonna High School Graduating class, of which I was one of twelve, the “Apostelettes” as we called ourselves, gave me an award during a reunion some years back for Creative writing, misspelling creative, in honor of our high school creative writing teacher, Pascual Talamantes. It was in his class that I wrote my first short story, MADA, about the last man on Earth. MADA was ADAM spelled backward. The haunting and corny last line still makes my best friend, Ellen Dowling and me, laugh. “The last man on earth had died and no one cared.”
I am the only person to have in my possession a “Pacual.” I love seeing the little figure of our teacher with moving googly eyes and remember that I also wore his suit for our Spanish class play, as he was also the Spanish teacher. It was slightly creepy to wear his jacket and pants but then again, that was what was needed as I was an actor and needed to play my role.
My awards are scattered here and there, but mostly there, in a back bedroom housed in and on a wonderful oak piece of furniture with a huge mirror and tiny shelves. I used to look at myself in the expanse of mirror as a young woman and wonder if I’d ever amount to anything. I would check my appearance in the mirror: No, I couldn’t see through my skirt if I stood in a doorway in direct sunlight, no slip showing from the bottom, no bra straps and no uneven hems. I was ready to go. My mother, Delfina, made many of my clothes and they were well made and “muy de moda”—modern and fashionable. She was an excellent seamstress who could look at a dress in a store and replicate the design and pattern at home. She was my first teacher of invention and creativity. I owe my endurance and fuerza/strength to her.
I started writing at age eight and the story of my writing roots are oft told to students. I still have my first story about a willow tree in our yard. I loved that tree so much, loved its cavernous rooms of green, its long lovely willow branches, that it distilled for me the essence and strength and beauty of a time. That basically is what writing is all about. The Willow tree, the Sauce Llorón, was sanctuary and respite, my outdoor home and my sister, Margo and I played in the luxurious world that was that tree. When I wrote about that tree at age eight, and again at age twenty-four, and if I were to write the third part of that story, it would encompass the history of my life and become a triptych of memory. I still have that tree stump in my back yard, the home I was born in, grew up in and where I still live. I tell my students: Something of that tree came into me and something of me went into that tree. To write is to love deeply. To be awarded and to be gifted for what one loves is indeed blessing.
A month and more ago, writer Max Evans called me to let me know he had nominated me for the Rounder’s Award, given to a writer who has contributed positively to the culture of the West through their lifetime of work. The Rounder’s Award honors those who “live, promote, and articulate the western way of life.” The award was created in 1990 by former New Mexico Agriculture Secretary Frank DuBois. It was named after The Rounders, a classic western novel written by Max Evans. I was thrilled to be talking to Max Evans, an iconic Western and New Mexican writer, someone whom I greatly admire and respect. I was elated to get the call. I admitted I had never heard of the Rounder’s Award and researched it immediately.
A rounder, as Evans defines it, is a cowboy who's been working in the country so long that by the time he goes to town he has more fun than he should. The award was named for Evans' book, The Rounders, later made into a movie and a television series, about two cowboys in the New Mexico of the late 1940s and early 1950s and the adventures they shared.
Evans was the recipient of the first Rounders Award, presented during the Western Writers of America convention, where Evans was being given the Saddleman's Award for lifetime achievement.
Since then, winners have included novelist Elmer Kelton, historian Marc Simmons, recording artist Michael Martin Murphey, watercolor artist Pablita Velarde, livestock magazine publisher Chuck Stocks, gallery owner and arts historian Forrest Fenn among others.
As I was only the second woman to be named a Rounder, I was very happy to be included in the company along with Pablita Velarde, the two of us the only multicultural representatives of a pantheon of mostly western Anglo men.
I have to admit I still look around the room to see who is there, who is represented and to count the Hispanos, African Americans and other people of color in the room, any room, unless it is a family gathering at Thanksgiving.
In earlier days when I was a fledgling member of the organization, The Western Writers of America, my mentor was the great historian and man of vision, Stan Steiner. It was he who brought me into the writer’s fold, he who encouraged me to step up and out, and yes, it was he who believed in my still unformed writer self. It was noticeable to me back then as it is still evident now that there are always so few Latina or Native American men or women in the room of privilege. In those halcyon days of trying to get my literary work into the world few believed in those of us who stood in the wings. I was living in Santa Fe and it was a good time to be a young, hungry writer. My mentors became Stan Steiner, Rudofo Anaya and Tony Hillerman. These teachers all gave me a foothold, a place to step forward and for their care and attention I am grateful.
This is ultimately a story about not losing, but winning.
When I found out the Rounder’s Award ceremony was going to be held in the Governor’s Mansion in Santa Fe, I protested the “political” nature of the venue. I am not a proponent of the Governor’s anti-immigrant policy. Why hold an event that honors the New Mexican artist in a place that to me signifies a lack of understanding of who we truly are as equal human beings? I grew up on the Mexican/U.S. border and know well the implications of the Governor’s policies and what they mean for us here on La Frontera. The Governor grew up in El Paso, on the border, but does her agenda truly represent the people from our borderland?
When I protested the Rounder’s ceremony venue, I offered an alternative space to consider, the Gutiérrez-Hubbell History and Cultural Center, in Albuquerque. Few buildings in central New Mexico highlight as much local history as the Hubbell House. Located along El Camino Real, the oldest continuously used European roadway in North America, its name comes from the family who built it in the years following the Civil War. It was originally the private residence of James L. (Santiago) Hubbell and Juliana Gutierrez-Hubbell and their twelve children; it later served at various times as a trading post, a stagecoach stop and the local Post Office.
The Hubbell House Alliance is a non-profit organization formed by the Committee to Preserve the Hubbell Property. The proposed Hubbell Demonstration Farm and Living History Museum provides many benefits to the community including job training for South Valley youth, local history tutorials, economic development for small-scale sustainable agriculture and advocacy of organic farming methods.
I thought the Hubbell House would be a good nonpolitical venue that affirmed the work mentioned in the Rounder’s Award press releases. Max Evan assured me that the award was not political. And yet, I felt that it was.
At age 65, my work is concentrated and becoming more distilled. The recent death of my older sister, Faride, has given me a perspective on the finite nature of my life, and solidified my concerns as someone who believes in the power of art to heal lives, and yes, to affect change. To this end, my husband, photographer Daniel Zolinsky and I are in the process of forming El Museo de La Gente/The Museum of the People, a living museum of art and culture in my hometown of Las Cruces. The People's Museum, will eventually house an arts complex which will be used for Artist residencies, workshops, local and traveling exhibits, a library and archives, as well as multicultural literary, literacy and arts events for participants of all ages in the borderland corridor as well as audiences from throughout the world. The Museo de La Gente will specialize in New Mexico/Texas/México/Chicano/Latino/ Native American, Southwestern and Borderland/Frontera Art and Literature, as well as world art, photography and books. The Museo complex will serve students, teachers, scholars and anyone interested in Culture, Literature and Art.
In addition, a Museum of the People/Museo de La Gente will house art, books, and memorabilia from various sources and feature the stories and memorabilia of local and regional families who are interested in preserving their traditions, roots and art.
To be an artist is to dream. To Envision. To Live Actively and Creatively. And without Fear.
There was always from the beginning of my invitation to become a Rounder confusion about where the ceremony would be held and when. I could never get information from anyone.
When I called the Agricultural Office recently to find out what the date and time of the ceremony, as I hadn’t heard from anyone for weeks, I was told that it was on November 14 and that I was no longer a Rounder.
I never got a call from either Max Evans or the Agriculture Department representative, Katie Goetz, in charge of publicity and scheduling, telling me I had been dismissed as a Rounder. Katie, the liaison, was out of town a week. So in the course of events, an award was there and then gone.
I am sad, yes, because after all was said and done, I wanted to honor of Max Evans, and his vision. But alas, it wasn’t meant to be.
Things could have been done differently. The Department of Ag, the people in charge of the award could have contacted me and advised me that I was no longer a Rounder. An announcement of my receiving the award was given to the NM Book Association last month and then retracted. All this leads to awkwardness. Meanwhile, back at the Border, I had announced on our list serve of thousands, including friends and family, that I was a Rounder. The person that was the most excited was my husband, Daniel.
The liaison, Katie, at the Ag Department said to me several times that “Someday when there is a Democrat in Office, we will ask you again to be a Rounder.” This statement and its naïveté shocked me. I am an Independent in my thinking and do not vote party line. I have never met the Governor. I do know what I believe and who I am because of my ancestors who have come before me. I am grounded in my family, my deep faith core that has little to do with religion, and I live in the realm of constant Creation.
I am still a Rounder in my mind. If a Rounder is an Independent Thinker who Stands up for what they Believe, then I am still and will always be a Rounder.
What matters is the work. I respect and love the awards I have been given, especially my “Pascual.” They have come from a place of joy and love and I am thankful for every award that has been presented to me throughout the years, from the Most Talented Student given to me by Sister Alma Sophie in eighth grade at Holy Cross Elementary School, to the most recent. The irony on the Most Talented award from Sister Alma Sophie was that she rigged the votes and I wasn’t really voted the Most Talented. I know because I was the one who counted the votes. Her altering the votes shocked me but this Gift of Grace will always be remembered and cherished.
A recent award from Wise Latinas International from El Paso is for My Love of Tacos. . .what can be better than an award that comes from home, family, hearth and an understanding of who I am and who we truly are? One global family.
There might be other awards, it doesn’t matter or alter who I truly am. Awards are arbitrary, usually unexpected and always appreciated, of that there is no doubt, but they are not expected or anticipated. To know who you are, who you truly are, where you come from and what you believe in -- “Quién Te Parió” as my Grandmother, Guadalupe Triviz Chávez used to say to anyone that came into her house. “Who bore you? Where do you come from and who are your people?”-- that is the Truest Blessing.
(Photo of Denise Chávez by Daniel Zolinsky. Saddle photo by Randy Heinitz.)
November 13, 2013