Category Archives: The Mami’hood

Single Mami’hood and Sexuality Under (Wed)lock & Key

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Yesterday two states, Michigan and Arizona, held their Republican presidential primaries and my womb apparently is on the campaign trail. At the last GOP debate in Arizona, all of the candidates took a lot of time to blame single mothers, especially brown single mothers, for many problems in the United States. The mainstream media, including a front page New York Times article, has fallen in line attacking single mothers of color and our kids for the poor state of the economy, crime, failing schools and the threat of nuclear weapons in Iran. Ok maybe not what’s happening in Iran but the arguments are just as ridiculous.

This revived attack on brown single mami’hood is just another front of a war of anti-Latino sentiment. It’s root is that same that led to anti-immigrant laws like SB 1070 in Arizona and HB 56 in Alabama. It doesn’t take a big leap to move from targetting anchor babies to calling my being a single mother of two a “social catastrophe”. It’s not hard to say that poor brown people with uteruses shouldn’t choose the type of families they want to create when in some states it has already been determined what books shouldn’t be put in the hands of our youth.

As Bianca Laureano points out one of her recent RH Reality Check columns, the cultural and sexual habits and values of Latin@s are still read through old, racist narratives like Oscar Lewis’s La Vida and  Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s The Negro Family. Rich Lowry, who was given a whole page to trash brown single motherhood in the same issue of TIME that highlights the power the power of the Latino vote, cites the Moynahan report as just the beginning of how a problem of “the underclass” (people of color) has climbed outside the realm of race. In other words, brown loose morals are catching. According to the editor of the National Review (full disclosure : I went to high school with the online editor of the NR), us poor, people of color just aren’t following the example of the upper classes who cling to marriage as a class rite of passage. Marriage, according to Lowry, is a way to climb the social ladder, if only we poor single moms would get on that ladder and find ourselves a good man. Lowry goes so far as to suggest a public service campaign in favor of marriage mobility with First Lady Michelle Obama as its spokeswoman.

There are quite a number of problems with the arguments presented by Lowry and by all who point to single mamis as the downfall of modern society. The whole family model relies on the invented notion of a whole, nuclear family that only really exists in the realm of 1950′s sitoms. I took enough sociology and history classes to know that The good ole days were never that good. The family model we are expected to aspire to leaves out extended families and families of choice including LGBTQ families. The assumption is that because I don’t have a ring on my finger that my kids are not inside a warm, loving home with multiple people caring for them. It assumes that the only legitimate relationship comes with a certificate. It assumes that it is better to be in marriage that contains violence than it is to be single it also assumes that women of color don’t have a right to control their sexuality.

It’s not that women of color have more sex than white women, it’s that the state has always intervened to control when and under what circumstances we will have sex and what the outcomes will be. Slavery, sexual violence via colonialism, forced sterilizations, rape, forced abortions, forced child birth, childbirth in chains, non-consensual medical prosedures and experiments have all been used as ways to control our allegedely uncontrolable sexuality. Women like me, unmarried women who haven’t achieved a certain academic or economic status, women who aren’t white – well we are just expected to keep our knees locked unless told or forced to do otherwise. Enjoyable sexual experiences are not for us.

We, women of color are blamed for having children out of wedlock and then having those children have more children. Forget the fact that according to a recent report by The Guttmacher Institute
the teen pregnancy rate dropped by 37% among Hispanics. The fact that the rates of teen pregnancy among black and Hispanic teens remain 2–3 times as high as that of non-Hispanic white teens isn’t blamed on a failing healthcare system or a failing education system (have you seen what passes for sex ed?). It’s blamed on our hot blooded culture. A large body of research has shown that the long-term decline in teen pregnancy, birth and abortion rates was driven primarily by improved use of contraception among teens. But instead lawmakers like Senator Roy Blunt (R-MO) want to pass laws that limit access especially to poor people of color.

I am sure that many would love to use my picture, my life, my story as a poster for what not to do. A Nuyorican twice single mami, without a college degree, struggling financially. It’s easy to give a white man like the editor of the National Review a page in a major magazine about my poor values than to ask someone like me how I am making it. It’s easier to have a major magazine run a feature on how important my vote is as a Latin@ than to confront the reasons why my vote is more important than my right to decide when and what goes in or comes out of my body. It’s easier but that doesn’t make it right and it doesn’t mean that while people are trying to lock my knees together, I should lock my lips.

Reading and Writing

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My four year old is learning to read and write. A few months in Pre-K has made her interested in identifying the letters of her name, her sister’s name, my name. My journals and and notepads and filled with scribbles that look more and more like letters and words. Sometimes in between the letters are stick figures which together, in preschool hieroglyphics, tell a story.

I visited Poroto’s classroom yesterday and was impressed with ho quickly a group of 14 4 year olds adapted to new routines including sharing lunch at a communal table, borrowing books from the library, helping new classmates find their cubbies. There were of course things I didn’t like – like the counting of children by their assumed gender- it’s amazing and scary how quickly children are taught to identify themselves into two neat categories.

In this period of transition I feel like I’m learning how to read and write again as well. I am struggling with finding space and time to write. Despite the fact that my mother’s apartment is bigger than what Casa Mala was, the actual space to be creative- the quiet needed- has been hard to come by. I blame the additional distraction that cable tv offers everyone, myself included. I do have a dedicated desk space, something I didn’t have at Casa Mala. It’s been helpful as new opportunities to write for major publications open up. I’m still trying to organize myself. Many of my books are still in bins and will likely stay there until this transition shifts into another one.

There isn’t anyone to show me the new routines though. No one to hold my hand and no one to celebrate the letters of my name and what they create and will create. I have been creating alot lately – controversy, poems, performances. I’ve reclaimed writer as I try and claim space.

But I’m still learning to read and write and translate the signs the universe is whispering to my soul.

The Mami’Hood Goes Back to School

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Call this a state of temporary bliss. A gift.

I am sitting in a cafe in the middle of the day – ok it’s really a chain restaurant that offers free wifi- but don’t ruin the image.

I’m sitting in a cafe in the middle of the day with an iced coffee and my fingers tapping away. My four year old is not pestering me to play a Dora game on the computer or to play with her princess toys. My 14 year old isn’t asking for the computer so she can update her very serious role play where the future of genetically modified vampire clone warriors is at stake.

It’s back to school time.

I never wanted to be one of those mamis, the ones in the commercials who joyfully run through the aisles of the office supply store because they are getting rid of their kids for a few hours pero here I am.

On Thursday, La Mapu started high school (!!!). She had to commute via the subway for an hour and go through a metal detector (Oh thank you NYPD secured DOE public schools). But despite her worry and mine (none of us slept very much the night before), she made it and actually liked it. She scored a new friend (a young woman who has never been to school before). Getting la Mapu into high school was a nearly two year process that involved tests, open houses, interviews and essays. I’m pleased that the hard work we both had to put in was well worth it (so far) pero the fact that we had to go through such a process pisses me off.

The only thing that pissed me off more than the high school application process was the Pre-K application process. Really wanting Poroto to attend a full day public school program meant putting myself through two lotteries, none which yielded ideal results. In this second round of the NYC Public School Pre-K lottery- Poroto was on of 46 percent or so that got a spot. She didn’t get a spot in our neighborhood. Nor did she get a full day spot. On Thursday I stood in a crowd of people outside her assigned school for over an hour- in the rain, with poroto. El Chileno came with thinking it would be a quick process, but he left to go to work. Clearly this was mami’hood business.

Once I made it inside the school, I was given a number (17), a stack of papers to fill out and we waited…….for two more hours. We sat through one assembly listening to the new principal of the school tell first and second graders that they were in school because President Obama wanted them to get good jobs and make a lot of money. We then sat though a second assembly where the principal told students that in the halls they should be “still, silent, and straight”. Umm yeah this was when I was ready to walk out and say fuck pre-k. Poroto – who napped and was more patient and quiet than I have ever seen her- begged me to wait a few more minutes because she really wanted to go to school. So I waited and finally our number was called.

The actual registering was fast. I had all my papers in order. The only confusion I caused was by checking off that my daughter was Latina and not white. With half an hour to spare before her first class, Poroto was an official public school Pre-K student.

Asking her, she’ll tell her her first day was boring, because I had to sit with her for orientation, making the grand total of hours spent in a public elementary school yesterday 5 and a half.

Pero back to today – with me sitting in a chain restaurant cafe, finishing my iced coffee, almost not annoyed by the ambient noise around me (note to self – next time do not forget your headphones), finishing a personal blog post! I left Poroto at Pre-K land’s special door. She didn’t cry. In fact we both skipped away happily in opposite directions, excited about the changes in our lives.

(PS – please consider donating to Poroto’s panderia fund which I will be renaming Mala’s cafe writing fund).

(PPS- I need to find a place where I can have a glass of wine while Poroto is in Pre-K. That will make this even more fun)

Unnecessary

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As the school year draws to a close, like every summer, I find myself scrambling, stressing and wondering how am I going to make ends meet for my little familia.

During the school year I make about 200 a week tutoring give or take 25-50 dollars. This means that in a month I make less than what my rent is. Factor in utilities, food for myself and two growing children, and transportation and yeah – you can see it’s gonna be a struggle. That is not even counting my poor attempts to pay off debts. I receive child support for one of my two children. Get another oh 100 dollars a month from my political blog and still end up borrowing from one place to pay something somewhere else (like the other editor on the website).

So far I have booked $150 worth of tutoring for the month of June and $200 for the month of August. Far below what I need to barely survive. The mini heatwave we had in NYC already raised by electricity bill by $40.

This morning I tweeted how I didn’t know how I was going to make it through July and August (oh and the rest of this month). ?Yesterday I tweeted that I would probably need to get another job for July and August. Which I probably will do. A follower suggested I don’t spend money on anything unnecessary. Which got me to thinking what exactly is unnecessary – not needed. So I looked at my shopping list and my to do list.

Shampoo – I can probably skip this for now
Pan – I have eggs in the fridge so that should be good enough for breakfast
Shaver – Ay who needs to shave their legs/pits
Avocado : See pan also I have rice in my pantry
Veggies/Fruits – I have one banana and some beans in the pantry
Sunblock – I guess going to the beach is not in my future or I can burn

flowers/cards – I guess those are not needed. I can make a card for baby daddies and amor de mi vida for Father’s Day

Vino : I haven’t had vino since I was in Los Angeles in late April/early May

Get nails done : I have a gift certificate for this but tip is extra. Cut.

Get hair cut : Haven’t had a haircut in about a year now. Look into those free cuts students give in the city (but you have to tip no?) Ay just keep cutting own ends.

Pay off three debts I am trying to pay down : My credit is so fucked up already who cares?

Pay Internet : I just paid half of what I owed so that they wouldn’t cut the internet and I could email the op-ed published in El Diario la Prensa and post other things to make a tiny amount of money/ Maybe I just need to rely on free wi-fi.

Pay Gas Bill : Not having gas sucked because then you have to buy prepared food outside which is more expensive than cooking your own food.

The twitter follower in question told me to look at my cell phone plan – I don’t pay for my cell phone plan at the moment thanks to a generous prize from Credo Mobile that will expire in September.

I was told to cut cable – I don’t have cable.

I am also travelling – which seems dumb no? Mind you they are for conferences and the airfare and housing is paid for as are some of the meals – but what about the meals that are not covered? Ground transport? These conferences have to do with my work as a media maker and an activist and also help me build deeper relationships with other people doing work/living like me but am feeling guilty about the vacation I took in late April/May with my income tax refund.

Maybe the broke ass don’t deserve vacations, conferences?

What is necessary in our lives not just for the survival of our bodies but the survival of our hearts/souls?

Ay and today is rent day.

Do Not Feel Sorry for (me) Us

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When I sat down next to your desk, with it’s neatly placed photographs of your daughter on her wedding day, I wanted to hear your take on the grade that went down. I already knew though. I knew that you, like every other teacher I had sat with that day, would say, “She’s so smart but..”

She’s always writing stories

She’s always planning what she will write in those stories

She’s always working on something besides her school work

And this you see as her failure, not yours

my failure, not yours

Our living arrangements, extended family supporting one another is suspect, not a successful example of community and love.

My work, writing/teaching/fighting is seen as not being attentive enough to her needs instead of modeling what working to love, not just to merely live looks like.

You said it was sad, sad that her internal meditations spilled on paper in ink were mistaken as a suicide note because you couldn’t believe that brown chic@s like her, whose name you still refuse to pronounce correctly, can/want (t0) write novels about other brown chic@s engaged in science and magic and saving themselves instead of waiting for you to demonstrate how to fill in a bubble for the right answer.

You said you felt sorry for me.

That made you stand apart and set you up as someone who like the elementary school principal who once looked at my hija and told her not to grow up to be like me, me with my big bilingual mouth and and my not fit for motherhood pink hair.

Ella, will no be like me, pero tampoco will she be like you. She already is the person she will be.

What Do We Tell/Show the Children?

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Holy winter break batman. When the kids are off from school, I barely have any physical space to myself, let alone mental space to process things out via typed text. In the space I occupy with my daughters, this space between Egypt, Libya, Puerto Rico, Bahrain, Algeria and Yemen, I have woken up on many mornings wondering how, what do we tell/show our children about movement(s), justice, and responsibility?

In the space I occupy with my children somewhere between Egypt, Puerto Rico, Libya, Bahrain y Algeria, in the same country as Arizona, Mississippi and Wisconsin, they bear witness from afar. And when I speak of my children, I am not just speaking of my biological daughters but of the community who sit almost daily at my mother’s kitchen table. I read aloud from the news. Pull out maps and point to these places.

My children are movement children. You can ask my mom and sister, who still laugh at the fact that La Mapu’s first full sentence was “No Justice, No peace”. Poroto, has traded in her “si se puedes” for “Egypt, Egypt, Egypt”. La Mapu has taken a renewed interest in one of her patrias, Puerto Rico, one afternoon surprising me by asking aloud from my mother’s living room as she watched cartoons, “how do the liberation struggles in the Middle East translate to the student struggles in Puerto Rico?”

I nearly cried with pride.

While she fought with her sister on the floor of Julia de Burgos in El Barrio, I noted she argued because she wanted to pay attention. She was watching the videos I have been watching and reporting on for months, of Puerto Rican students getting beaten, tear gassed and sexually assaulted. She was paying attention, on her own terms.

I stopped forcing la Mapu to meetings, conferences and rallies as soon as she was old enough to stay a few hours by herself but she can’t escape that this is the world we live in, impacting loved ones, some whom she has met, some whom she knows through their blogs and twitter avatars. Last night, she cried over the dead in Libya and all I could do was hold her.

But what of the children who are left unaware as I was as a child. When I woke up at age 16 and suddenly realized I had been lied to about history and my role in it, I felt angry, betrayed and motivated. My life has never been the same.

I am participating in an event as a story teller in a local museum in a few weeks. The theme is art and activism. How do I talk with children who don’t witness and navigate these spaces on a daily basis or are like those Central Park horses with their eyes fixed on the tiny camino in front of them, blind to the rest of the world around them that they stand in the middle of?

I have never lied to my children about the struggles that exist in this world. Some of them they experience on their own, some of them through my work/life. But what of the children who are shielded? How to hold their hand slowly, open their eyes slowly so they are not afraid but awakened?

That is the question that has been waking me up for weeks.

I welcome answers/suggestions.

Thinking About Teen Abortion y The Privilege of Absent Papi’Hood

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I don’t have cable so I missed the MTV special on teens seeking abortions. I wanted to see it because 13 years ago I was a teen seeking an abortion. Well, kind of. I was 19, pregnant and in Chile, a country where abortion was and still is illegal. My housemates, other young mujer college students far from their home (although in their country), and I watched a special on TVN de Chile about underground abortion clinics filmed with uv cameras that made the young women look like ghosts. One of my housemates confessed to having used such a clinic herself. And I was weighing my own options.

The other person responsible for my pregnancy didn’t want me to stay in Chile (what I wanted at the time) and instead told me that I was better off returning to the U.S. where abortions was allegedly safe, accessible and legal. I stayed in Chile travelling for a while longer, convinced I wasn’t going to carry my obvious pregnancy to term. By the time I made it to U.S., I was too broke to afford an abortion and too far along anyway.

It’s not that I regret mami’hood or la Mapu. Most people know that I have centered a good portion of my identity around my role of mami and 13 years, another kid, and yes two abortions later, I love mami’hood, even in its moments of struggle.

Pero the papi? I think I am connecting my own personal history with abortion with fatherhood because recently la Mapu’s father has pressing hard to see her. He hasn’t seen her since she was 3 or 4 and is talking to my sister apparently even to get her to accompany la Mapu to travel to Oaxaca where he is chilling now, not paying rent and working at a hostel to feed himself and his girlfriend.

It’s not that I don’t want la Mapu to see her father or that I don’t want him to see her. I would never deny that, but there is a part of me that remembers him sending me on my way. Yes he was young, but for 13 years I have registered voters, sold furniture, temped, table danced, tutored and written my heart out for my hija and he’s been travelling the world, with his college degree picking fruit because his job in Chile bored him. So yeah, maybe I am a tiny bit resentful and irritated.

The language of choice doesn’t always translate across continents. Access isn’t always interpreted precisely. And parent’hood or not isn’t always an accompanied trip to Puerto Escondido.

How Many Resets Am I Allowed

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Because it feels like I hit that button in my life over and over.

I bite off more than I can chew, projects that I want to do because they feed my soul and heart and really my soul and heart are greedy little creatures. I want to marry poetry and make love to community activism based in radical collaborative love. These are things I have tasted, shared with my hijitas pero then….

la maldita capitalist vida.
la maldita fucking bills.
la maldita fucking rent.
la maldita fucking life.

I just paid my rent that was due almost a whole month ago and now in a week rent is due again and I know I will be short and late again.
I mean I’m blessed, blessed because my landlord has been really generous and understanding pero I am ashamed. On those late days I teach my children to be extra quiet, make themselves invisible so we won’t be as obvious.

So much for radical fucking mami’hood

And then there are the days of watered down sopa and rationed cereal. Again, so blessed because we manage. We are all relatively physically healthy and have more food than so many others and thank fucking the ancestors for my mother and her willingness to help us fill our bellies. But again, ashamed. At 33 I should be fucking doing better at feeding my own fucking children.

On the days I walk the mile plus to my mother’s house, where I tutor, I front like I do it for the health of the familia. We are all getting our exercise but more than likely it’s just because I cannot afford to get us all on the subway and they are raising the fare. In the summer and fall it is not so bad but what about when the snow comes and the fare is raised again?

This week feels like a reprieve. I mean I am saving up to try and make rent next week. I am working. I just bought coffee filters. There is food for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Nada Fancy but our bellies will be filled and the rent is paid for this week. I hit reset again. Feeling a little ashamed at unfinished projects and playing furious games of catch up with my hand ready to hit reset again.

It’s Autumn Because I am Not Falling

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A former lover who is back in town after some time away said something like the title of this post when I texted “Happy Fall”.

There is truth there.

This summer in many ways sucked. I was making half of what I usually make in the fall and winter and I’m still behind on the bills and paying people because of it (note the addition of the panederia fund in the sidebar). I couldn’t travel to a wedding or take la Mapu to see her father. Deadlines came and went and I was always drowning in something : debt, work…

A reencuentro opened my heart to be broken again in a way I didn’t but should have expected.

The political blogging felt more like an obligation and not an act of love. I couldn’t pay editors on time and lost a writer and felt like I was out there doing it alone.

September was mostly a dark month, with me obsessing over my poverty and how that led the denial of small requests from my hijas, obsessing over real health concerns and how I am going to get care with no insurance, and how obviously yet again, I was not a woman worth fighting for.

There were rays of light like an unexpected trip to Detroit to be at the AMC and among some of the most beautiful people to have graced my life.

But mostly the summer had let me down.

Fall, I mean autumn, however, and especially October and the days right before it have opened my heart again especially to the healing power of art, in my case poetry. It makes me happy to write and read my work. I will post details in the next few posts. I will also be posting some new poetry and videos.

I am excited to be inspired by love and not longing. Acceptance and not deceptions. Arte no siempre tiene que ser un acto de sufrimiento.
I’m still broke (two weeks behind on rent but at least our electricity is on and the kids have food). I’m not seeing anyone now or even fucking anyone (besides myself) but I am enjoying the silence. I’m still drowing in work. I’m still doubting my place as a “political” blogger. I’m still worried about some health stuff.

But I am not falling.

M/others, Mamaz and Community Care-Givers Unite Through Truth-Telling at the AMC

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Cross posted with VivirLatino

There were many reasons for my attending the Allied Media Conference, including to see dear friends but I also went to help present, specifically this workshop:

M/others, Mamaz and Community Care-Givers Unite Through Truth-Telling!
Presenters: Rachel Caballero, La Semilla Childcare Collective; China Martens; Future Generation & Don’t Leave Your Friends Behind; Kidz Space; Katina Parker, New Orleans Labor of Love; Maegan “la Mamita Mala” Ortiz, VivirLatino/la Mamita Mala
Facilitator: tk karakashian tunchez, To tell You the Truth/New Mythos Project
TRACK: INCITE! / To Tell You the Truth
M/others (self-identified single, teen and welfare mamaz), mamaz and community caregivers around the country are telling their truths through zines, blogs, printed media, performance work etc, and using this process of truth-telling to create stronger selves, families and communities. In this 3-part, interactive workshop, we will share practical skills and organizing models, then strategize on how we can support each other year-round through a national network of mamaz and community caregivers. Come share your questions and your knowledge with us!

This session will take place in three one hour parts. Part one is a knowledge fair, showcasing the many incredible projects in the room. Part two is a skill share, giving you a chance to learn some specific truth-telling and organizing techniques, including: zine-making, social media, on-the-go-video-how-to, blogging 101, and building a radical childcare collective. Part three is a strategy session for all us m/other, mamaz & community cargegivers in the room to think, dream, strategize, and envision specific ways we can work together over the next year. We will explore questions like; What do we bring to the tables as mamaz? What support do we need? How can we fortify our national community and our families? How can alternative media-making further our movements and transformations?

This session prioritizes the participation of mothers and community care-givers of color, but is open to all.

The session started with TK Karakashian Tunchez, of To tell You the Truth/New Mythos Project introducing the audience to the session, how we got here, who we are are, and what we will be doing; basically laying the foundation.

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