First Grade Feminism

Today was the 1st Grade Poetry Celebration.  Each student read an original poem at a microphone in front of a crowd of adoring parents.  At the end of each piece, applause was given and one compliment was taken from the audience.  The poems ranged in length, subject, and ability.  Miss Thing read an original work about Mt. Lassen, her favorite place.  It’s brevity driven more by her lack of study skills (can we really attribute …

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Women in Combat

Secretary Panetta made the official announcement: 230,000 military combat roles will be open to women.  I think this is a tremendous stride.  Since combat operations are necessary for real high-ranking advancement in the military, this will open the door for women to have more meaningful military careers and a voice at a most important table.  Like every other hall of power, I think things will be better – more solid, perhaps – with women’s perspectives …

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Rubio vs Castro: What Makes You Latino?

Now that the political theater of the conventions is over, the commentary keeps plowing on from: who got their message out, who motivated their base the most, and, oh so importantly, which party had the best (read: most) Latino representative. I’ve complained in the past about demographers insisting that the Latino Vote is a monolith.  Insisting that Latinos swear political allegiance to only one party is just a different way to stereotype, as far as …

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Is 20 Years Enough?

I attended my 20 year high school reunion this weekend.  It was crazy and more than a little surreal.  High school is such a strange transitional time.  You move from barely being a teenager to almost being an adult, with none of the self-directed growth you can do in college.  Basically, you are thrown together with a lot of people you probably would never have chosen.  And all together, you must survive four years of …

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The Wrong Kind of Brown

Followers will know that Deldelp Medina and I have a session submission in to SXSW. One of the things that SXSW is very clear about is that your session should answer 5 questions that you need to articulate before you can submit.  The five questions we came up with are these: Why isn’t our generation of Latinos considered exceptional? How do we become visible in the media landscape without being reduced to the lowest common …

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Welcome Back to Public (Private) School

I went to Catholic school from K-12, so when Miss Thing started at our local public school last year, there were a number of things that didn’t really phase me that seem to give folks a lot of consternation. First, I don’t really worry about what teacher she is going to get.  There was only ever one class at each grade for me from K-8, so there was no choice.  Maybe I just haven’t been …

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SXSW Really? Yes.

I recently developed a proposal for SXSW with Deldelp Medina, one of the smartest people I know.  If you knew my friends, you would know that this is really saying something.  Our proposal is about the confluence of stereotypes that keeps people like us – Latinos of our generation – out of leadership, power and influence.  You can read more about it at the SXSW panel picker. Family and friends keep asking why.  Why this, …

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What Is a Soul?

Sitting down to dinner tonight and the following exchange greeted me: Miss Thing:  Mommy, is a soul blue?  What is a soul? The Husband:  I want to hear the answer to this… Me (taking my time chewing to try to compose something of a satisfactory answer to my 6 year old daughter):  No, I don’t think a soul is blue.  Some people think that a soul is the thing that makes people different from animals.  …

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Ritual of Love

This week, I went to Children’s Hospital in Oakland to witness my 13 year old god-daughter Ariel’s First Holy Communion. I first wrote about Ari on this blog here, and if you want her complete story, you should see the Caring Bridge site her mom maintains. Ariel’s story is hers, and not mine, so I will simply say that in her quest to make some sense and gain some understanding of this phase of her …

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Random Acts

It’s Tuesday night and already it has been a long week. Office life is a bit treacherous just now but dinner still needs to get on the table and it is clear to me that cooking will not happen. Oh well, the girl has been clamoring for Chipotle so I decide to stop and be the hero to at least one person today. I get the car parked and make my way to the restaurant. …

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