Addiction is the Legacy of the Born Immigrant
To many in the Southwestern United States and Northern Mexico, the United State’s enactment of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was nothing more than a fancy smoke and mirrors tactic that allowed the U.S. to steal huge pieces of land from its rightful owners.
One of those land owners was my great-grandfather, Jose Inez Quintana. He was born in Mexico. His daughter and my great-grandmother, Geñoveva Quintana, was born in the United States. Only, they were born in the same physical place: San Ildefonso, NM...
Gary’s Underwear?
I put my underwear on backwards this morning, and that’s why I’m for Gary King in his race to become Marquis de Nuevo M against the current Marquesa, Susana Hanna. You don’t really need to hear more about my wardrobe mistake, but you must hear about Gary’s spine-tingling campaign. You see, Gary is just like his dad.
I remember Gary’s father, Bruce, cruising through the old UNM SUB in his cowboy hat, gray suit, bolo tie and $300 boots...
Farewell to Books?
A friend wrote the other day to tell me her novella had been published. Where can I get a copy? Here’s the link, she responded. And when I went to it I discovered her book was only available on Kindle. No hardcopy at all! This was my first experience with what I fear may become commonplace, a gradual replacement of physical books with their digital imposters, something like cloning gone wild.
Call me old-fashioned. I like to read real books, material objects with pages I can turn, a cover that draws me in, inked pages that in some cases even smell of the old bookmaking craft...
What Happened to Democracy?
In 1917, the United States entered World War I, because, in the words of President Woodrow Wilson, “The world must be made safe for democracy.” Today, however, the more pressing issue is whether democracy can be made safe for the world.
The essence of democracy has been reduced by its advocates to a series of ritual formalities and frozen institutions—political parties, elections, written constitutions...
Public education is not a sporting event
Hanna Skandera tells us, in a recent Albuquerque Journal guest editorial, what should have been an inspirational and heart-warming story about her glory days in track, when she trained for months for that one big cross-country race at the end. She came in second. It’s implied that the rest of them were ranked-and-filed as, I assume, winners and losers?
First, academics and cognitive development are not cross-country. Learning is not a race; learning is a process. Learning is not a competition; learning is a quest...
The Myth of the Good Mother
Who is the good mother? From the earliest representations of women-- Paleolithic figurines with wildly inflated reproductive organs – through modern mothers Facebooking their cleanest, happiest family photos, she is a creation mixed with history, culture and pure imagination. The good mother has features we all recognize—her supernatural patience, unwavering attention and empathy, submission to the needs of others, and an expectation to have her own value measured heavily by the outcomes of her offspring.
The problem with the good mother is that she is a myth that many women rely heavily upon as the role model for their real, dirty, wonderful but emotionally turbulent motherhoods...
The Wind Rises: Miyazaki’s Most Personal Film
In The Wind Rises, anime master Hayao Miyazaki adds his own memories and obsessions to the real life of Jiro Horikoshi and the writings of Tatsuo Hori. The result is a complex film of great beauty, one that has angered the right wing in Japan for its attitude toward 1930s militarism, and disappointed others worldwide for its failure to show the consequences of the hero’s quest.
Jiro Horikoshi designed the innovative Zero, a long-range and highly maneuverable fighter used in the attack on Pearl Harbor. Once the United States had caught up in fighter design, the Zero became a manned missile...
Weekly Poem: Certainly, Water
When I think of water spilling from a green bottle onto a wooden floor and the danger
it poses to a carpet and the Moroccan women I met once, Berber women with kohl
lined eyes and mehndi on their hands, who made carpets from wool they sheared
themselves, and who ululated on request for pictures because outside of Morocco that’s
what they were, ululating Berber women— ...
Lines from Eleven Introductions to New Mexico
New Mexico holds a unique tricultural position in the history of the United States.
Although a modern reader might surmise that “New Mexico” is derived directly from the place name “Mexico,” as we now identify that modern country, it has instead a somewhat more complicated history.
Trinity stands for the Christian culture of the Spanish and later the Anglo Americans as well as for the Trinity site in White Sands, where the world’s first atomic bomb was detonated on July 16, 1945...
Albuquerque’s River
Most people in Albuquerque see the Rio Grande in flashes, from a bike path or a bridge. But really? That’s no way to know a river. It takes drifting downstream and sometimes, running into sandbars. The river provides water to cities and farmers. But it’s also a place of wildness, and of solace. Here's an audio postcard from a canoe trip in the spring of 2013...