Living Beyond Borders

YA anthology 

"The idea for this anthology arose when our heritage came under attack in the media.  Witnessing the constant spread of negative information fill my newsfeed, I felt compelled to do something.  To fight back against the damaging rhetoric and biased images that clashed with the culture I lived and loved."

     Luckily Margarita Longoria was able to do something to combat the demonizing of Mexicans by the Build A Wall! crowd and their allies.  Living Beyond Borders: Growing Up Mexican in America, of which she is editor, is a celebration of the diversity, beauty, bravery, and resilience of the culture she grew up in and embraces.  The pieces by talented Mexican American authors included provide readers with the stories she found tragically missing from her newsfeed.  

     "As the bus started toward downtown, the two teenyboppers' piercing voices, foul language, and shrieking laughter were becoming intolerable.  They were in that junior high stage when obnoxiousness and vulgarity made someone more popular among their insecure peers.  But I guess it was pretty normal teenage banter.  Then they said it--a word I had previously given little to no consideration."

     In Dominic Carrillo's Ghetto Is Not An Adjective the narrator witnesses a bystander telling two girls who called each other Ghetto as an insult that it's a noun referring to the place he lives and describes both the perils and beauties of living in a place too many people only associate with gangs and crime.

"Tell me a story.

Dime un cuento.

It can be a long story, or it can 

be a short one too.

It can be a brand-new cuento,

or a favorite old one."

     In Xavier Garza's Tell Me A Story/Dime Un Cuento, done in a graphic format, an appealing small child makes a near universal request of a distracted dad.

     "When I got home, I told Mami what had happened.  Her smile disappeared.  She helped me out of my dress, hung it carefully on the nail, but not before I saw tears running down her cheeks."

     The child narrator of Guadalupe Ruiz-Flores' My Name Is Dolores is only weeks into her first year of school when the teacher instructs the children to wear their best clothes for class picture day.  Her mother puts a lot of work into grooming her for this very important occasion.  Then just before the picture is taken her teacher takes her aside away from her classmates and camera range.

"He could only give me one dollar 

a week.  On Fridays, when I'd serve him 

dinner after work, he'd pull the single dollar bill

out of his worn wallet with weathered 

Hands--hands that had cut and transformed 

mesquite, planks, shingles, tiles, and cement."

     Guadalupe Garcia McCall's Ode To My Papi brought tears to my eyes.  Her words brought me back in time to when my now engineer son Adam, would tell my husband he would be a construction worker "just like you, Dad" and Eugene would say, "No, you will do better.  You will work with your head, not your hands."  Across race, ethnicity, time, space--any other divide you can think of--so many workers put their all into creating opportunities for their beloved children to have better lives.

     This anthology is like a sampler box of candies.  Readers discovering an affinity for a particular author can look in the listing in the back of the book 📖 to see what else they've written.  I've added some titles to my to borrow by inter library loan list.  ❤️ 💙 💜 💖 💗 💘!

On a purrrsonal note, the weather continues hot and muggy, temps we in Maine aren't used to.  I can't imagine what people in states like Texas are coping with.  Tobago sleeps more during the day.  At night with the AC on she's ready to party.  She had me up three times last night.  It's like having a new 👶.  Luckily she's irresistible.  🍅 s are finally coming in in community garden.  We're watering, harvesting, and cover cropping.  Yesterday I insisted on carrying watering cans.  The water spillage kept me cool.  We had 🍉 and Zoe's good shortbread 🍪 s for snack.  (Jules)

It's much too hot for us obligatory fur wearers.  I'm a big fan of AC.  (Tobago)

A great big shout out goes out to the community garden crew.

Tobago and Jules Hathaway 

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