Girl In A Coma

I heard about this great girl punk band, Girl in a Coma, and fell instantly. They are from San Anto! They should have been playing at the gay pride fest - they are really good. And their videos are genderqueer/questioning/feminist - well done. Even better, they are backed by Joan Jett's label. Sweet Joan Jett.

Here's one of my new faves:

Road To Home-Girl In A Coma

sleeping

I have slept all week. I've not slept great but I have slept and I am so thankful for it. Of course, I did not write but you can't have it all!

I especially thankful for the sleep because my work has been increasingly demanding since I'm leaving the department for another. Add to that my child's recent expectant behavior (it is her birthday - that's her reasoning) and a test on Thursday and I had to give in to sleep.

So by 10 or 11 I've been the good girl and gone to bed.

I felt better this week, not just because of sleep but because I was able to tell a number of people what it was I really wanted in my life, what kind of people and how I couldn't feel less than totally free and so I couldn't conform to others ideas or expectations.

Delhi Micaela Reyes Boitel

My baby is 8 today. She's so fresh and mature looking, it kills me!

I got an email this morning about how we (Delhi and me) have been named "family of the month" at Family Pride. Believe it or not. Here's the link.

I just think about Mica (as we call her when we aren't asking her to complete her chores - it's Delhi Micaela then) as that tiny kid with a huge guitar who played with Lourdes Perez. Here's a link to my memory of it.

call for submissions

Some really great mujeres in the RGV are putting this together. Send your work!

Café Revolución Presents:Voices Against Violence! Zine

Second issue

Deadline: July 1, 2007

Voices Against Violence! Zine is accepting submissions for the second issue. Please send in your essays, poetry, personal accounts, artwork & photography to be included.

What is the Voices Against Violence! Zine? A small publication, chapbook style, with writings from people in the community who have been affected by domestic violence as well as survivors of domestic violence.

We encourage the public to submit because domestic abuse affects the community as a whole. The Voices Against Violence campaign, part of Café Revolución, is a series of events and workshops throughout the Rio Grande Valley that helps break the silence on domestic violence, encourage others to come forward and weave a collective consciousness in our community.

Send submissions & questions to:

noemi.mtz@gmail.com

horticulturelandia@gmail.com

For more information, scope out:

http://www.caferevolucion.org/

http://myspace.com/voicesagainst

fraud

I felt like such a fraud when I entered this weekend. I haven't completed the writing I've been wanting to, haven't completed even cleaning the house!, and felt as though I was holding myself back, wasn't allowing a clear view for anyone, even myself. I really felt like some dark cut of glass - transparent but with this coloring that doesn't let you decipher everything.

I was told by someone last week that they were checking on me by checking on my blog. This isn't all of me, I realized. This is very little. I mean, I've been up to so much, there have been so many changes that I can't keep up with them. Not in a physical way but mentally. It seems all these things in my life are having a tremendous impact on me.

For instance, I would not have thought that taking 6 little girls out for my daughter's birthday would have made me feel so feminist and capable of awaking young minds. And, conversely, would make me want to have more children so deeply.

Or, having a peach for breakfast on Friday that blew me away with its texture and smell. I haven't been awake in my body for a while so I was taken aback by such an incredible thing: dirt and humidity and sun and perfume and musk all at once. Or, in going to lunch with a faculty member here - the Indian food we ate intoxicated me. I love my body very open to experience. The textures and tastes filling me. It can be overload but it empowers too - and not just my writing.

I did settle down some after Carol and Lilia's arrive Friday evening. We went to go see Gaytino!, a performance piece by Dan Guerrero, son of the "father of Chicano music", Lalo Guerrero.

Conversations with my sister friend Carol this weekend let me talk something out - always helping me see more of something long before I would have on my own (mostly because of avoidance or denial). I always felt this dichotomous idea that I had to choose to be in a relationship or choose my creativity.

While my creativity is by no means destructive (i.e. Sylvia Plath), I've felt it spinning a little beyond my control. I can manage it but wonder if, given some foundation, it might come out more tactile. Right now it feels like a fire in me that threatens to take everything in the air and make it something else.

I'm mis-saying because it is not destructive - I just wonder if, with more avenues to express myself, I might be able to keep the emotional fuel of my creativity in check. That this might also encourage better sleep and more consistent self-care (right now I'm eating one end up eating one meal a day and way too many cups of coffee).

And while it's not specifically an intimate relationship but more like connections with people that can aid this, I of course think about relationships. Since moving here, this is the most personable I've been. I'm really feeling available, open, transparent. Or, at least trying for transparency. I have reminded myself people will like me if I'm this way - and if they don't, at least I wasn't lying and they weren't interested in some part of me that was not complete truth.

Before the gay pride festival on Saturday, Carol and Lilia and Delhi and I went to Casa Chiapas for lunch. The festival was sweet, much smaller than ones I've been to in San Francisco and Austin but also very community-oriented - no entrance fee, lots of community booths, local talent performing. Most of the larger ones do out of town talent and charge $10 to get in. We didn't get there until 5 p.m. or so and so I was surprised I didn't see more of the people I knew there. In looking at the website they were there - I guess I arrived too late. I did see a former co-worker from when I worked at the San Antonio Symphony. I knew she was family but I think I surprised her because she didn't clock me that way.

At Casa Chiapas, I felt all Kitchen Table Press, we were talking about defining as queer vs. lesbian vs. bisexual and how neither world cares for those who are not "gold-star lesbians". That was a huge discussion for me that I don't want to talk about now.

So, I felt a little better by the time the mujeres left late Saturday. Still lots to process and I would like to talk a little more about it. Of course, despite my increased socialness, I find myself alone tonight. . . and what I have in my head is way too big for some shallow conversation.

my niece

Well, here she is everyone - Deja Matilda, my niece.

See, she does look like me! I'm trying not to make a "that's what you get face" but my brother said, over and again, that he didn't want his baby coming out looking like me. Hmmm.

Con mas ganas - she even has my curly locks! I'm already whispering tips on how to manage the untameable hair.

My mother said I could trade my child in for this one since mine looks like my brother!