How to Turn An Essay Into Cardboard

Olga García Echeverría

It's true. I have spent the last semester torturing a wonderful group of students at Cal State LA with cardboard and paper lunch bags. Our 3200 Chicanx Latinx Studies class, Pre-Columbian Myths in Latin American Literature, was a standard class in the sense that we met regularly, had assigned reading, took quizzes, participated on online Moodle forums, did presentations, and had plenty of in-class wiri-wiri on topics such as the Popol Vuh, the destruction of pre-Columbian texts during colonization, Joseph Campbell, a little Carl Jung. We explored some of the texts of Julio Cortazar, Elena Garro, Rosario Castellanos, Carlos Fuentes, Edwidge Danticat, Yuri Herrera, Sandra Cisneros, and Myriam Gurba, who came to our class and dazzled us with her insight on and obsession with mythology and ghosts. If anyone can tango with La Llorona and Juan Rulfo's ghosts, it's Myriam!

In the Beginning was Cardboard 

I will blame my cardboard obsession partially on my mom. Thanks to her, my siblings and I grew up always having the almighty recycled cartón at arm's reach. Recycled cardboard served many purposes--childhood playpens, Moses-looking writing tablets, scattered rugs to cover up peeling linoleum, to name just a few.

Eloisa Cartonera, an Argentinean publishing house that  prints, distributes, and sells handmade cardboard books in Buenos Aires, is also an inspirational culprit. As is Cuba. In the 1990's, I traveled to an international poetry festival in La Habana and found cardboard book wonders, intricate and incredibly beautiful, cardboard things to fall in love with, really.

My obsession deepened in 2010, when my good friend tatiana de la tierra (a long-time fan of Latin American cardboard books) and I embarked on our own self-publishing adventure. Cardboard was our chosen medium that allowed us to take publishing into our own hands.

The result was late night rendezvous with boxes, X-Acto knives, Mod Podge, and the creation of about 100 poetry chapbooks each. To read a previous blog on this self-publishing cardboard adventure: https://labloga.blogspot.com/2010/05/cardboard-creations-homemade-libros.html

The thing is it's easy to get obsessed with cardboard. It's pretty accessible and abundant. Almost everywhere you look, there is used cardboard to be given or collected. It's workable. With a good blade, it cuts easily. It bends without much resistance. It's incredibly versatile; it can be canvas, paper, book cover, protest sign, or even life-size political cutout. The work of Ramiro Gomez, another major inspiration, illustrates how versatile and powerful cardboard can be. Gomez uses life-size cardboard cutouts to disrupt social spaces and bring attention to marginalized people/workers.

Cardboard is also contagious. Take my colleague, Alejandro Covarrubias. We used to share an office and talk cardboard. Inspired by Ramiro's work, he has taken cardboard into his classrooms the last two semesters. These are life-size testimonies and narratives on issues of race, class, gender, police brutality, and more.

A.K. Toney's Paper Bag Literacy Books

Another primary inspiration in the creation of handmade books is poet A.K. Toney. It was A.K. who first introduced me to mini-poetry books made out of paper lunch bags. We were at a Poets & Writers Workshop Leaders Retreat about 3 years ago when A.K. pulled out a wallet-sized poetry book that captivated me so much I later emailed him, asking him for an interview and a lesson in the bookmaking process. He graciously complied to both. A.K. and his wife Kristi Toney have been using these handmade mini books to teach literacy and the arts to inner city children via their organization Reading is Poetry. To read a previous blog on A.K. Toney, and his paper bag books: https://labloga.blogspot.com/2014/09/passion-power-and-paper-bag-poetry.html

Taking Cardboard and Paper Bags Into the Classroom

For the past few years, inspired by the previously mentioned people and places, I have been teaching students how to make their own cardboard and paper bag books. This has been mostly with 5th graders in Wilmington, California. Thank you Angels Gate Cultural Center and LAUSD for providing creative writing to 5th graders! Everywhere I go these days, cardboard and AK Toney's paper bag books seem to go with me.

To read a previous blog on how fifth graders are using paper bags to showcase their own creative writing: https://labloga.blogspot.com/2016/04/all-that-and-bag-of-poetry-creative.html

This past year (first in the spring and now in the fall), I decided to bring cardboard into the college classroom. Why did I wait so long? My Pre-Columbian Myths in Latin American Literature class at Cal State LA seemed like a good place to start. My primary goal—to disrupt (if even a little bit) traditional writing assignments and to challenge students to engage with course material and their own ideas via recycled materials, visuals, and text.

If you want to disrupt a college classroom in an interesting way, take in crayolas, crafts, and cardboard, and then tell your students to do something with it. There will be a few students (probably artists already) who will instantly love the idea and be ready to fly. You had them when you walked in with the art supplies. But there will also most likely be those students who respectfully mad-dog you. Their eyes will seems to say, Crayons? Is this the 5th Grade? And there will be the students who are totally down, this is evident in their openness and enthusiasm, but they will tell you later, "The truth is, Ms., I didn't know what you were talking about, but it sounded interesting, so why not?" In any case, all classrooms are full of personalities and different preferred learning styles. No assignment can please all the students all of the time. It's good to keep that in mind.

Aside from wanting to engage students in new and interesting ways, I confess that bringing cardboard into the college classroom was also for me. When you've taught writing and literature for an extended period (22 years and still counting), the writing assignments and the grading can, well, to put it mildly, begin to kill you softly. There is nothing more dreadful than reading disengaged essays written in formulaic five paragraph structure. Mátenme, please. Even when we attempt to “unteach” that old pedantic dinosaur, the five paragraph essay persists. What I learned this past semester, however, is that cardboard and paper lunch bags are well equipped to bring down dinosaurs. It's not even a battle; it just happens.

Pre-Columbian Myths in Latin American Literature 

The assignment I gave my Pre-Columbian Myths class this semester was to engage with a myth using, among other things, recycled cardboard and paper lunch bags. Images could be created or they could be cut out from magazines or taken (for collage-type visuals) from the Internet. For their topic, they were free to chose a myth covered in the course, a myth not covered (the chosen myth could be from any place/culture in the world), or students could also opt to retell a myth from their own family and/or create their own original myth. They could, if they chose, flesh out their story in stages, using Joseph Campbell's concept of the monomyth and the Hero/Shero's Journey as a guide.

Students were given specific guidelines. For instance, everyone's book had to include a summary of the chosen myth and a discussion of the deeper meaning of the myth and what it reflects about the culture from which it originates. Lastly, a re-envisioning of the myth; if you could change anything, what would you change and why? Students writing their own myth had to answer a few brief questions on the creative process and make connections between their original work and course material. Aside from having students post short reflections and pictures of their books in an online class forum, students also presented their books to one another face-to-face. Our presentations were our final exam and although I know presentations can be nerve-racking for some, I don't think anyone suffered too much during our final. We were, after all, munching on tamales, brownies, carrot and celery sticks, and listening to myths and ghost stories from Mexico, Central America, the Philippines, Haiti, Japan, and Greece.

This one takes place on a rancho in Mexico. It's about the student's father's encounter with a supernatural algo. The cover, which features a pirul tree, was on the verge of turning into a piñata. These are the things that wake up a teacher "a un jalón" and send her on the Internet to research pirul.

The inside was also interactive. With "Reach In If You Dare" and "Lift Here" instructions. Best of all was that the student engaged his father and brought a piece of him into the classroom. In his reflections, the student wrote, "I took the chance to share this myth with my classmates due to its originality and coming from a person who does not share much, or what I like to call him 'un hombre de pocas palabras.' I’ve know a lot about this myth due to always hearing it in my father’s hometown since everyone makes fun of him for what had happened to him. However, I got the full story when my father broke down the whole story. I chose it because I value the few words my father tells me and I took this opportunity to share what I believe is a true story with many others.”

We got to hear about El Sombreron, who seduces women with his guitar and then bewitches them by braiding their long beautiful hair. (If you want to render him powerless, get a pixie cut). Despite claims to lack of artistic ability, many students created their own drawings for their books.

We heard about Central America's La Segua/La Cigua, who appears oh so beautiful to drunk and disloyal men. When the cheating men least expect it, La Segua's head turns into one of a horse and the men are, to say the least, pretty much screwed. 

Fantastic, no?

A womyn of color femynista in the class dismantled Coyo, the Aztec Moon Goddess, and then lovingly put her back together again. This is cardboard, paper bag, broken pieces of glass, and critical text that unfolds as you read. It's one of the most beautiful "essays" I have ever seen and the dismantling/discussion of patriarchal elements in the myth are refreshing and right on. The student shared that her title "Even In Pieces I Exist" was partially inspired by Maya Angelou's "Still I Rise." 

This book belongs in a book museum.

We looked at the far away and the local. This student delved into Tongva creation myth because we're on Tongva soil, after all. This one was a book housed within a book.

This student, who wrote about La Llorona, created transparencies of her own drawings and text. She said she originally wanted to stick solely to recycled material, but she decided not to because she also wanted to use transparencies to highlight the theme of invisibility. It's hard to capture in Iphone pictures, but the way this book works, when you're holding it in your hands, you can't really read the text or see the pictures clearly. You have to put a blank piece of paper behind each page and then the scenes of the narrative appear like ghosts as you read. 

Who in their right mind wouldn't want to read Chela, Mi Abuela, y Los Duendes? 

There were students who chose to write about the cultural or familial myths they grew up with. This student, for instance, wrote about duendes, which her mother believes in. Inside one of the book's pockets are two family duende stories handwritten in Spanish by the student's mother. It was such an intimate experience to read this family's stories. I felt like I was reading a letter from a relative in Mexico. The fact that this student's mother was participating in our class in this extended but meaningful way meant so much to me. More evidence that creative projects open up unexpected windows and that if you put your heart (or your momma) into it, you can start off with cardboard and end up with gold.

Of course, there was overlap of topics sometimes, but every approach and cardboard creation was completely unique, each its own art piece. More Coyo...

The books weren't free of their technical errors, glitches, or gaps, but these things were minimal compared to what they produced. Really, these are so lovely, it's going to be hard to give them all back.

This is La Loca Siguanaba. Chiquita pero picosa y asustosa...

And this is The Story of Dreams, done by a student who insisted, "I'm not creative..."

There was a book on the flower of Day of the Dead...

It had hummingbird pop-ups! Yo, these students have pop-up skill!

More pop-up with Belphegor...

There were mini-book wonders on Myriam Gurba's work that opened up like this...

Books that wept and wept and wept until they became A Pond Full of Tears...

Hold onto your horses, everyone, here comes El Jinete de La Muerte. Ajua! I wished for popcorn while reading this one.

Even when they appear quiet and small, don't underestimate these libritos. In this one lives a Chichen Izta pyramid.

And you can't have a cardboard museum of mythology, without the Greek Goddess of the Underworld, Persephone. It's okay if she's not Pre-Columbian or from the Americas. For the final, they could venture anywhere in the mythical world.

And you know how it is, whenever Persephone's around, Hades is bound to show up...

This student delved into Aphrodite, Greek Goddess of sexual love and beauty. She confessed she wasn't feeling the cardboard as much, so she created a pamphlet-like book. She shared during her presentation that she works with elementary-aged kids, and as she was puting finishing touches on her book at work (they have lots of crafts, so aprovechó), the kids circled around her and asked her if she would read them her book.  Sex Goddess and elementary school? Maybe not the best combination. Even when we want to translate for age appropriateness, you can get in trouble, so it's better to be safe. I know this because recently I had La Sirena (the Loteria card) banned from my 5th grade classes. Yeah, her chichis are exposed, but nobody seems to mind El Apache's nipples, and El Mundo is shirtless and wearing calzones. But that's another battle to be discussed in another blog. My student managed to keep naked Venus away from the children's view and dodge the reading request.

This student dyed the pages of her book in tea, crumbled them for texture, and then burned the edges. She said she wanted the book to appear old and magical, similar to the book given to Ofelia, the child protagonist in Pan's Labyrinth.

She drew original drawings in ink and all the text was beautifully handwritten. 

Aside from contemporary film, Indigenous Mexican myth (via Subcomandate Marcos) was also presente.

As were stories from the Popol Vuh...

One student wrote about her family's traditions on Dia de Los Reyes. Remember, if you get the baby inside the rosca, you have to make tamales! I think the whole thing is a ploy to continue with the tamal eating well past Christmas.

We went to Haiti and learned about Voodou. This book opened up into a portable presentation and addressed the racist media depictions of this spiritual practice. Did you know that the first major African slave insurrection in the Americas, which led to the Haitian Revolution of 1791, initiated with a Voodou ceremony?

And we traveled to Japan and into the sea. This is the tale of Urashima Taro who fell desperately in love with a mermaid...

One student discussed the Aztec mythology in the structure of Yuri Herrera's Signs Preceding the End of the World. When we have to make the shero/hero's immigrant journey through deserts and militarized border zones, that's El Camino Seco. 

One student admitted that it was very hard for him to stick to the cardboard. He kept wanting to prepare a laminated presentation (because he has a laminating machine at work and he couldn't help himself). He seemed a little stressed about laminating every single page, but it worked out fine. Creatively speaking, I met the students wherever they were and I practiced being as open with them as they were with me. Lamination (this time) okay. 

Have you ever heard of Kapre, the Tree Dweller? I hadn't. This is a dark creature that appears as a half-human giant dwelling on treetops and smoking cigars. I was captivated by this Filipino myth which my student traced back to the enslavement of Africans in the Philippines. During Spanish colonization, the Spanish brought Africans to the Philippines and called them by the Islamic term "Cafres" (later becoming Kapre), which connotes brute, pagan, savage, something uncouth. The stories about the dangers of Kapre can be tied to slave revolts and the Spanish's attempt to vilify all things African and instill fear in Filipinos. My student argues that this was perhaps a tactic to create divisions between the native Filipino population and Africans to weaken the possibility of a unified revolt. Although he grew up hearing stories about Kapre and being warned about him, he was unaware of the myth's origins and deeper meanings until doing this project. 

One student wrote about the Changuengue of Nayarit, Mexico, who is so mysterious, "even Google does not know of him." 

And as a cardboard bonus, she recreated her mother's bedroom in a shoe box! Her mother is lying there under the blankets. Now we're really going 3D. That's the crazy Changuengue trying to be sneaky, sticking his head out from behind the closet door. Can you imagine how much fun I had reviewing and grading these?

This is an original myth, "Mundo y Mujer." It's a story about a woman who embarks on a journey to save the planet from destruction. She succeeds.  

The inside contains lovely watercolor and cut-out art.

I'm still going through student feedback, and it is too much to process and share in this post, but one student shared that "she felt like a real writer" while creating her book, and another that laying out the myth in separate pages made her pay closer attention to the details. Finally, here is what the writer of Mundo y Mujer said about her experience with creating a cardboard book in lieu of a traditional final essay. 

"This project was very different, in that I had never done anything like this before in my college career. I think this project made me have to think, and make more connections between what we have learned in class, and art. I liked that we had the option to make our own myth up, and I felt I had to make even more connections, and engage more with previous class content in order to make up a meaningful myth. I also think by using an art component, it made it more engaging, and less monotonous than what we normally have to do with essays. This project should continue to be the final for the class because it requires deep thinking in both the art, and the writing component."

There are many ways to make cardboard and paper bag books. Here are a few links if you'd like to try:

How to Make Cardboard Books #1
How to Make Cardboard Books #2
How to Make A Paper Bag Pocket Book 

Thanks to my students who were so open-minded with this project. Despite a good number of them claiming, "I'm not creative," they did an amazing job. I have no doubt their right and left brains were activated. Did I mention that they had cardboard for the midterm too? That was warm up. We made archetype-like Loteria cards with an image on one side and text on the back. Here they are standing by their thematic cardboard Loteria cards, which we displayed on the 3rd floor of King Hall at Cal State LA. Look, there's actually a dinosaur being overtaken by cardboard in the display case! Evidence of co-existence as we move forward onto multiple ways of learning and writing. 

Feminine Energy

Desert Goddess by Margarita Guerrero

It’s December 12th as I write and it comes as no surprise to me that today Merriam Webster selected the word feminism as their word of the year, defining it “ as both “the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes” and “organized activity in support of women’s rights and interest.” The Politico article covering the Merriam-Websters selection says “Following a year that started with global women's marches and ended with stories of sexual harassment and assault that have brought down powerful men in media, tech, Hollywood and politics, one word has been looked up continually throughout 2017: feminism.”




For on this day the Virgen de Guadalupe is celebrated and I and others who have an interest in such matters, think that it’s synchronistic, affirming that our world is experiencing feminist energy taking a larger role in world and personal affairs.




 Goddess of Agave by Rock Martinez & Cristina Perez, Tucson Az.

People identifying with New Age and spiritually minded individuals believe that all of us have masculine and feminine energy, as does the world, the Southern Hemisphere associated with feminine energy and the Northern Hemisphere with masculine energy. They saw the election of an Argentinian and a devotee of the Virgin Mary as Pope, as a confirmation that feminine energy was to take center stage.



 
 Home Shrine Virgen de Guadalupe Tucson Az.



Those of us from a Catholic background believe strongly in the mother aspect of the divine that has manifested in numerous times and places such as in Mexico City, Lourdes, France, and more recently in Medjugorje, Bosnia. But the feminine aspect of the divine is also embraced by millions of many faiths. She is Kwan Yin in China, Schekhinah among Jews, Shakti of the Hindus, Tara of the Buddhists and the ancient Egyptians called her Isis.









 Aztec Dancers 4th Annual Procession Virgen de Guadalupe, St. Joseph Parrish, Tucson Az.


It is understandable that people would embrace the mother aspect of the divine, she being more compassionate and forgiving and thus easier to love than the harsher more rational masculine aspect.




 Nativity Tableau, 4th Annual Procession Virgen de Guadalupe, St. Joseph Parrish, Tucson Az.




Balancing the feminine and masculine energy is an activity that all individuals will undertake, all of us thinking more with our heart and all of us becoming more assertive and logical. In the near future, we’ll also see that countries in the Southern Hemisphere will begin to develop economically and socially, keeping pace with the countries of the Northern Hemisphere.

There is an Inca prophecy that states that in ancient history the human race was split between those of the Condor who pursued intuition, love, and connection with the Great Spirit, sometimes referred to as the feminine path, and those of the Eagle who would pursue intellect, industrialization, and science, or the masculine path, and of a time when the people of the North, represented by the Eagle, and the people of the South, represented by the Condor, awaken to the realization that they are more capable of consciousness, love and awareness when unified. 






That evening I attended the fourth annual Procession honoring the Virgen de Guadalupe where I photographed musicians, Aztec Dancers, tableaus and individuals attired in costume.

 Virgen De Guadalupe 4th Annual Procession Virgen De Guadalupe St. Joseph Parrish, Tucson Az.

Fire and Ice, But Mostly Hell Fire

Melinda Palacio

The Thomas Fire rages. Photo by Mike Eliason

My neighbors in Santa Barbara left town four days ago. The city has been raining ash for over a week. The culprit, The Thomas Fire (or firestorm), is the largest wildfire of the year and the fourth-largest in the state's history. The news is not quite the end of the year bang  was hoping for. I had a different kind of firestorm and shake-up in mind, one that would happen at the White House, and not in California. Before voluntary evacuations were issued for my neighborhood, Steve and I had already shoved off to ring in the holidays in New Orleans. I also had a reading at the Latter Library in New Orleans, where I had a chance to preview some of the new poems in my upcoming poetry book, Bird Forgiveness, out in 2018 by 3 Taos Press. A funny moment was when the M.C. introduced me as having a book out soon from three tacos press. I had to defend my press, my poetry, and love for tacos in one breath. 

            A week ago, New Orleans experienced a weekend so cold it snowed briefly. I was in awe watching the snowflakes fall. I must admit the charm of the ice falling soon turned into sheer torture as I don't do well in cold weather and my broken, metal-leaden leg started talking to me and complaining as well. The same day as the miraculous and sudden Southern snow storm, the Thomas Fire broke out and started swallowing all in its path in the California cities of Santa Paula and Ventura. The fire, which began on December 4, continues its almost two-week rage and now threatens Carpinteria, Montecito, and Santa Barbara, the lovely coast town between the ocean and mountains, known as paradise, where I am lucky to call home. With fires in the San Fernando Valley and San Diego, this monstrous fire seems impossible to get a hold of. I worry about not having a home to come home to and about all the damage already done to the land and people of this drought-ridden and dry state. How I wish I could send some of Louisiana's rain to California. To add insult to injury, there are people preying on the fire victims. I would have simply ignored the warnings on social media about false charities trying to wring money out of people who are being assisted by firefighters. However, I received a call from someone with a 323 area code phone number. This person, I don't recall his name, made a pitch for collecting money for equipment used by firefighters.  A legitimate organization to donate to is the Santa Barbara Firefighters Alliance. News I heard just today about the fire makes these charlatans seem insignificant.

            Nothing prepares you for the news of a fatality due to the fire. Hearing that one of the firefighters, fire apparatus engineer Cory Iverson, 32, lost his life battling the fire is heartbreaking, to say the least. My deepest condolences to Cory Iverson's family. I can only imagine the state of shock the San Diego firefighter's family must be in. As of yesterday, Thursday, December 14, the Thomas fire is 60 miles long, 40 miles wide and 35 percent contained. Prayers for all 8,000 firefighters battling the Thomas fire, prayers for wind cooperation and no more fatalities. 

         

Remembering Michele Serros: A Writer's Journey

                     
Daniel Cano

                                                                 

                                                       

    In the spring of 2015, I received a telephone call from the Santa Monica College Foundation asking if I would present the SMC distinguished alumna award to writer Michele Serros, who had been a former student of mine.
    “Of course,” I replied, sadly. I knew Michele had been fighting cancer, and she was putting up a courageous battle.
    We’d kept in touch over the years. As her writing career blossomed, I would ask her to visit my creative writing classes. We’d also meet at different literary functions. One time, we laughed as we found ourselves standing on the same stage receiving awards for our work. She always called me Professor Cano.
    “Michele, we’ve known each other fifteen years. Call me Daniel. You aren’t my student anymore,” I’d tell her.
    “But I always see you as my teacher,” she would say or something to that effect.
    She did stop calling me Professor Cano and called me Mr. Cano--the closest she could get to my first name.
    When I heard the SMC Foundation had invited Michele to campus to receive her award, I was looking forward to seeing her, and I hoped that she’d be well enough to read from her stories and poems. Actually, Michele didn’t read. She performed, always holding a book in hand. Michele had become a successful businesswoman, as well as a writer. I don’t doubt that she wanted her audience to see the book’s cover and title. She was her own P.R. machine, a difficult role for many creative people. But Michele was always up for a challenge.
    When I saw her at another function, she said, “Mr. Cano, can you believe it? I’m writing for George Lopez. And I got to meet Cheech Marin.”
    She never lost her sense of wonder. She sounded like a little girl getting to play with her new toys.
    Her first book, Chicana Falsa, and Other Stories of Death, Identify, and Oxnard, published when she was a Santa Monica College student, by Santa Monica College’s Lalo Press, received excellent reviews. But when she realized bookstores wouldn't place her book on their shelves, she loaded her boxes of books in her car and drove wherever she could read and sell her books, fine-tuning her performing skills.
    A few years after she’d transformed her readings into performance art, she told me she had accepted an invitation to join the Lollapalooza music festival to read her work.
     “Michele, you realize that’s an alternative rock tour, like the Chili Peppers and Suicidal Tendency-type bands?”
    “Yeah, I think it will be exciting,” she told me.
    Undaunted, Michele took her boxes of books and set off like she was running away to join the circus.
    She knew it would be difficult. But she also knew that her name--and the title of her book-- would be splashed on flyers and posters across the country. She was right.
    I followed her progress during the tour in newspaper reviews and read that Michele had won over the prickly-- and probably very stoned--alt-rockers. The next time I saw her, I asked her how it went.
    “Professor Cano, you wouldn’t believe it,” she said, using a very girlish, embarrassed tone. “It was awful,” she laughed. “I’d be reading my poems and all the guys would be yelling, ‘Hey, babe, take off your top. Let’s see what you got underneath.’ Oh, my God!”
    I wasn’t surprised at her success. She was softer and much less obscene, but just as accessible, as Charles Bukowski. Like his characters, hers were real: her family, uncles and aunts, college friends, and, of course—Oxnard. She wrote humorously, yet thoughtfully about the difficulties they faced in life. Their pain and laughter were also ours.
    In fact, the scary thing about knowing Michele was that you never knew if you were going to pop up in one of her stories and how she’d portray you, as one of my colleagues learned when he failed to make good on an honorarium he had promised her.

                                                                                   

    I met Michele in the early 90’s. She’d enrolled in a Chicano Literature class I’d been teaching at Santa Monica College. She confessed that she didn’t know there was such a class. She didn’t even know there were Chicano or Chicana writers. In fact, I’m not so sure Michele was too familiar with the word Chicano(a). She talked more about skateboarding and surfing.
    She told me that she wanted to be a writer and had already written a few stories and poems. Shyly she asked if I would read some of her work. Whenever students ask if I'd read their stories or poems,  I usually had to figure a way to tell them nicely that they needed more practice. But with Michele, I read in amazement, completely engaged in her characters and stories. I encouraged her to write more. She did, and she would come to my office regularly, and we’d discuss her work, as well as her education, UCLA her dream school.
    It was a special period in my life. I had published my first novel, Pepe Rios, and was waiting for the publication of my second novel, Shifting Loyalties. My colleague Ernesto Padilla had just been hired by SMC to start a Chicano literary press, which he called Lalo Press, named after his grandfather. Ernesto had been working and publishing other Chicano(a) writers at the time, like Carmen Tafolla, Cordelia Candelaria, Roberto Cantu, Maria Herrera-Sobek, and Rudy Anaya, established poets, writers, and critics. But he always had his eye out for new talent, including student writers.
    I told him about Michele’s work. When Ernie read her stories, he recognized her talent. He wanted to publish her. She needed more stories, and she wrote them. She got some help from another colleague at SMC, fiction writing teacher Jim Krusoe.
    I helped her with some of the general editing, and Ernie guided her with the language, not that there was much guidance necessary. For the most part, Michele had already begun to cement the foundation that would be her first book, Chicana Falsa.
    I was a little hesitant about the title since I could see some Chicano activists and critics taking shots at her title. But Michele knew what she was doing. The Chicana falsa to which she referred was the false persona youngsters adopt when under pressure from those who demand they act or look a certain way. Though Michele struggled with identity, she refused to limit herself to the cultural boundaries others set for themselves.
     She was a Chicana who surfed if she damn well pleased, and she refused to become a barrio stereotype. And even if she was raised in Oxnard’s hardscrabble La Colonia, she was still just a short skip to the beach she loved so much.
    Culturally, some might say, the odds against a young Chicana from La Colonia graduating from UCLA and becoming a respected writer, were like—well, Icarus flying too close to the sun, tempting fate, and losing his (her) wings.
    I remember Michele telling me about a UCLA professor in whom she’d confided regarding her dream of becoming a writer. The teacher had told Michele that she wasn’t a very good writer and would need to practice a lot.
    “Professor Cano,” Michele said. “I have such a hard time writing the way they want me to.”
    I told her, “Michele, that’s because most academic writing is pretentious, bloated, and boring. But it’s what you need to do to get your degree. Don’t let it change your real writing.”
                                                         
                                                                             

   
    I had a publication party for the release of my second book, Shifting Loyalties. I invited Michele to read some of her work. She was so excited. There were about a-hundred people crowded into the small lounge on campus at SMC: college administrators, faculty, family, friends, students, and the community.
    As I expected, Michele had everyone riveted from the first words out of her mouth. Many people there, especially those of my parents’ WWII Chicano generation, had never heard stories by a Chicana writer. Michele had them laughing, sighing, oohing and ahhing as they heard her breathe life into—not just hers--but their stories, as well. For that’s what a true artist does—speaks for those who don’t have the voice to do it themselves.

    The years passed, and the next time I saw Michele she told me she was living in New York, still writing and publishing. By this time, her name was known throughout the literary reading circuit. Across the country and in Europe, professors were assigning her books to their students.
    She told me how much she loved New York.
    “Mr. Cano, guess what?” She asked, a note of naughtiness in her voice. “I met Arthur Miller.”
    “The playwright?”
    “Yeah, that’s him.”
    “The one who married Marilyn Monroe?”
    “I think so.”
    She went on to tell me that she had been at an event and Miller had been there. Someone introduced her to him, and he took a liking to her. He asked her to lunch. Of course, Arthur Miller was old enough to be her great-grandfather. She said, giggling, “Can you believe it? I think he was trying to pick-up on me?”
    “Maybe he just wanted a friend, so why not a pretty, young Latina? Who knows, he might help your career.”
    “Oh yeah, right, just a friend, I’m sure, Mr. Cano,” she said, giggling.

    A few days after receiving the call from the SMC Foundation asking me if I would present Michele’s award to her, I received another call from Michele’s close friend, Renay Garcia, who helped organized the award ceremony. Renay and Michele had remained loyal friends since they both worked at Michael’s arts and crafts store in Santa Monica, years earlier. Renay confided in me that Michele might be too weak to make the trip from Berkeley, where she was living with her husband.
    Michele didn’t cancel engagements, unless the situation was dire. I felt a heaviness inside. I wanted to call her, to see how she was feeling. But I knew how she was feeling. If she couldn’t make the trip, she had to have been terribly ill. I also knew she didn’t need another voice telling her how sorry he felt. So, I waited, truly thinking she’d get better and come receive her award.
    A day or two passed. Michele’s husband called to cancel. Michele asked if I’d accept the award on her behalf.
    It was an intimate affair, attended by the president, the Board of Trustees, the SMC Foundation, a few public figures from Santa Monica, and some friends. Michele’s picture was placed prominently around the room. I listened as other speakers explained the event and the reason for honoring Michele, an SMC alumna who had accomplished what all professors dream for their students. Then I heard my name called.
                                                                     

                 
                                                                               
    Numbly, I walked to the podium. I looked out across the room. I spoke a little bit about my friendship with Michele and about her writing. I found it difficult trying to get strangers to connect with a person they’d never met, so I decided to let Michele speak for herself.
    I opened Chicana Falsa, the olive green, inexpensive Lalo Press edition, not the newer, prettier, more sophisticated Penguin/Putnam printing. In many ways, the first edition was even more like the Michele I knew: a little off color and rough around the edges, whose bold voice drew us in to her world. This little book had confirmed to readers everywhere that Michele Serros, Chicana from La Colonia in Oxnard, was now a published writer and that she had reached her first dream along a journey that would include many more.
    I turned the pages to her poem, “La Leti”, and I began to read Michele’s words, “La Leti/ Her steady hand outlines inside bottom eyelid/ thick darkening to a deep velvet black.”
    But they weren’t just words. They were Michele’s reflections on illusion and reality, innocence and guilt, and a profound love a young girl felt fearing her older sister might slip into a dangerous, violent world.
    For me, it was a sad and a proud moment. Everyone applauded for Michele. I hope their energy reached her in Berkeley.
    I accepted Michele’s award. Probably it was the last award she would receive. The first award, as a student, was the publication of her book. This last award recognized her contribution in showing educators the immense possibilities that lie within all students, and within all children.
     I awoke, not long after, to read, in the L.A. Times, about Michele’s passing. The last hope had slipped away. Renay called me at work that morning to tell me what she knew of Michele’s last days. She had visited Michele regularly.
    Renay said, “She wanted everyone to know that this is just the next part of her journey.” To me, that sounded exactly like Michele, never seeing anything as final but just another step on an uncertain path.
    As they say, the world is a better place for having her in it. Good luck, my friend. If a teacher gets one student like you in one’s career, then all of the work will have been worth it.

Books About La Virgen de Guadalupe

The Beautiful Lady: Our Lady of Guadalupe

Written by Pat Mora

Illustrated by Steve Johnson and Lou Fancher

Every December, Grandma Lupita tells Rose the story of Our Lady of Guadalupe. As they make paper flowers to put around her statue, Grandma begins: Long ago, on a cold December morning near what is now Mexico City, a man named Juan Diego put on his cloak and started down the road to church. On his way, Juan Diego sees a beautiful Lady at the top of a hill. She tells Juan Diego to go to the Bishop and ask him to build a special church for her. But the Bishop doesn't believe that Juan Diego has seen the Lady; he asks for a sign. Again the Lady sends Juan Diego, and again the Bishop asks for a sign. Until finally, she provides one: her shining image on Juan Diego's cloak for everyone to see.

Our Lady of Guadalupe

Written by Carmen Bernier-Grand

Illustrated by Tonya Engel

One morning, while walking to an early church service, Juan Diego hears a voice calling, "Juanito! Juan Dieguito!" He comes face to face with the Virgin Mary! "I would like a shrine built on this hill", she tells him, and she instructs him to take her wish to the bishop. Juan Diego, a lowly peasant, protests that the bishop will pay no attention to him, but the Virgin says that she will protect him. Juan Diego visits the bishop three times, but only after he brings a sign from the Virgin, a bunch of roses that are miraculously blooming in December, does the bishop relent and agree to the Virgin's request. From then on, the image of the Virgin is imprinted on Juan Diego s rough cactus-fiber tilma, the cloak in which he carried the roses. Today, millions of pilgrims visit the shrine and pray before the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Tonya Engel's sweeping oil-and-encaustic illustrations capture 16th-century Mexican country and city landscapes with stunning clarity. An Author s Note about the origins of the legend and miracle is included.

Our Lady of Guadalupe

Written by Francisco Serrano

Illustrated by Felipe Davalos

Our Lady of Guadalupe is the most important religious icon in the Americas. This lavish pop-up tells her story and that of Juan Diego, the humble Mexican peasant to whom she appeared on a hill in Tepeyac. The Virgin tells Juan Diego that Tepeyac is the place where she would like her sacred house built, that she will love and help all who seek her there, and that he must relay this to the bishop. At first Juan Diego is not believed, and the bishop asks that he return with proof. Vivid pop-ups convey the anticipation when the Virgin tells him to fill his cloak with flowers and the thrill as Juan Diego presents the flowers to the bishop, revealing a beautiful image of the Virgin on his cloak.

Guadalupe: First Words / Primeras Palabras

Written by Patty Rodriguez and Ariana Stein

Illustrated by Citlali Reyes

Lil' Libros baby board books uses a simple one word/one image per page format to introduce the littlest readers to first concepts such as numbers, colors, and body parts. Lil' Libros also introduces children to Latin American culture, history, and traditions!