Where I Come From

My Life in the desert is much like an enigma.

 “Many plants not only survive, but thrive in the harsh conditions.”

My home is in the desert, where it has been desolate and harsh.

My body yearns for water in the aridness of the land.

Quenching my physical thirst brings me only to become thirsty for a spiritual and mental

knowledge.

A knowledge that is often not taught in school.

A knowledge that teaches the intricacies of my peoples past

barren and vast, a history that is slowly shaping this young and innocent mind.

A knowledge that will grow with the land in both strength and humility

a knowledge much greater than myself.

Field Log-Zimmerman Library

At first glance the Zimmerman library has the authentic look of New Mexican architecture.  The building itself was designed by an architect by the name of John Gaw Meem and his look for the building was inspired by Spanish pueblo structures.  The library was originally opened in April 1938 and over the years it has served multiple purposes for the university.  Zimmerman has gone through some modern changes, including the ability to find a book within seconds, multiple computers are available to all students and of course being able to buy a coffee at the Starbucks  before starting a long night of homework.  This is the Zimmerman library that all of us have come to know.

As my group and I explored the library, we noticed how one side has more of a modern feel while the West Wing was kept in the old style and giving off more of an authentic feel.  As we stood outside of the south entrance, we noticed how you could see an ATM through the front doors.  It made us feel a bit uneasy about a library displaying a money object right before you even enter.  Of course once we went inside the modern feel continued as we saw all of the hardworking students with their eyes glued to computer screens.  Zimmerman is also undergoing some minor remodeling that gives off the idea of a changed library.  At the circulation desk the student workers sit as they go through the motions of their work-study job.  Not a lot of students realize that the library not only offers a variety of books to check out but also study rooms, computers, chords, tablets, kindles, textbooks, headphones, the list goes on and on.

As we made our way into the West Wing, immediately you could tell the difference based off of the design elements.  The ceiling is made entirely out of wood with vigas of different styles throughout.  It is much quieter than other areas of the library and can definitely give off sort of an eerie feeling.  The employees on this side of the library were much older and none of them students.  The murals along the walls were what we noticed next.  Each one represents three racial groups: Indian, Spanish-American and Anglo and the last picture of the mural has all three figures that represent the “dawn of a new day.”  The entire West Wing is very beautiful and I really felt glad that they kept it this way instead of modernizing it.

I’ve worked at Zimmerman for nearly three years now and I never really stop and take time to notice all the history that is around me every day.  It really is a beautiful place and there are definitely a handful of stories from older employees as well as the newer ones.  It was very fun to take a mini tour around the library and take the time to look at the art work and all the architectural work as well.

   

Reading Response

“There were still men and women who could identify the village a stranger came from by his or her accent, who knew the local name for every field, every hill, every wild plant.  They knew their landscape by heart.”-Chicano Culture, Ecology, Politics pg. 168

When reading the information on the land and the changes it has been going through, I kept thinking about my own family who originally come from Villanueva New Mexico.  Now, my grandpa had been a rancher for most of his life and there are acres and acres of land that belonged to him, my dad and my aunt and uncles.  Soon it will be passed down to my brother, my cousins and I.  Because we have never actually lived in Villanueva, we don’t know the first thing there is about taking care of or even owning acres of this land that we are to inherit.  You could have placed my grandpa in the very middle of an open pasture and he would know exactly where he was and where to go.  He had his own language with the land as well as with the animals he kept there.  Since we don’t really know anything, it makes me wonder, is our family ever going to learn about this land we have and tend to it?  Or will we be forced to sell it and let it all fade away into a distant memory?  Who would take it over and what would they build?  I myself would do what I can to keep it, but at the same time I also wonder what future change will happen and if it will keep me from saving the land that is supposed to belong to us. 

Where I am from

“a mirror to the front of me/and an ocean behind,/I lay wedged in the middle of daylight,/paper-doll thin, dreaming,/then I vanished. I gave the day a fingerprint,/then forgot” – Carmen Gimenez Smith

I’ve battled with the image of El Salvador, of Guatemala.

My father has created several paintings in our house

of his homeland. The truth is that this places live in mosaics

of green, mango orange, and sky blue water.

My mother picks up leaves around our block

in an effort to remember the leaves she pressed

down into a pit and bounced on top of.

Or to remember its width she recalls

the size of the leaves, palm size, 
now I become part of that moment.

To say I am from my parents countries

is abstraction. In my mind lie landscapes 
that hold secrets in the pockets of craters, 
in the bag of a volcano

holding forth its true voice.
Sharp, deep and haunting. 
The one thing I try is to hold onto, 
with a thing thread:  where I am from. 
Through the eyes, their hands, and whispers
of my parents.

At times dreaming of belonging to these lands

is important. The mystery of sitting on the stump

found along a dirt road in El Progreso, Guatemala. 
The dirt-heavy scent I can only imagine.
Then the wonder about how tall cornfields may 
be in El Salvador. How they stand tall, 
and if maybe they bend. Or do they billow beneath
the bodies of woman hiding from the sun. 

Where I am from

Where I come from

Isn’t it funny how we pin our home

to a bunch of rocks and piles of sand

and concrete blocks

as though the rotting bones of sweaty ancestors

gives us purer meaning. I guess there might be truth

in it. Everyone must cling

to something, I suppose

and rock is more stable than feeling.

But I come from a country that staked a flag

in every patch of land it found

as if it meant something, as if rock

meant more than the red

they tread into the dirt with heavy army boots. Forgive me

if I choose not to build my home

from rock or bone, but I hope you know

it all dissolves, eventually.

As long as I keep breathing the feeling follows.

I am 5,000 miles from the city I was born in, but I come from

blood that floats in wells of thoughts. I hear them now─

the voices and I know that I am lucky

to know I am loved, to come from wherever I want

and to still know my home. 

“Where I am From”

A poem in mirror cinquain form

(because I'm kinda terrible at free form poetry)

Mike
Albuquerque exclusively,

though traveling often,
only Albuqueruqe is home.

Mike

Home is friends, family,

memories, and time.

All Albuquerque.

Mike 

Vaya Con Dios, Vicente Ximenes!

Vicente Ximenes, rights activist, dies at 94

Read the eJournal Albuquerque Journal Sunday March 2, 2014

 

XIMENES: Believed in the dignity of humans

 

By Nicole Perez / Journal Staff Writer

PUBLISHED: Sunday, March 2, 2014 at 12:05 am

 

Ana Ximenes remembers moving to Washington, D.C., as a child with her father, knowing very little

English and sprinting from the school bus to her home because she was Mexican-American and

different from the other kids in her neighborhood. “My dad felt sorry for me but said, ‘You have to fight back and stand up for yourself,’ and I’ve been doing that ever since then,” she said Saturday.

It’s an attitude family members say Vicente Ximenes displayed throughout his life. The longtime

grass-roots civil rights activist,scholar and White House appointee died Thursday night in Albuquerque

at the age of 94.

 

Ximenes was renowned both in Albuquerque and on a national level for his work with the Agency for

International Development (AID) in Panama and in Ecuador, he was a founding member of the American

GI Forum chapters in New Mexico and was appointed to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission by President Lyndon Johnson. He was instrumental in organizing the El Paso hearings, a summit with President Johnson in which the conditions of Mexican-Americans were highlighted, and the hearings led to widespread social change, said University of New Mexico English professor Michelle Kells.

 

Ximenes’ friend Armondo Lopez first met him in Panama working for AID, where the pair tried to

improve education and economic opportunities for Panamanians. The group established credit unions

for low-income farmers throughout the country. “He was dedicated and determined, his commitment – which I saw and understood much more later – to helping others was tremendous,” Lopez said Saturday. “There were a couple of instances where he got out of his sick bed and went to the office, maybe at the detriment of all of us, just to encourage us to keep on trying to make those projects we were involved in a success.”

 

Born in Floresville, Texas, Ximenes received a bachelor’s in education and master’s in economics

from the University of New Mexico in the 1950s. He also received an honorary doctorate from UNM.

One of his early projects, said Ximenes’ son Ricardo, was helping Albuquerque sanitation workers get

showers after work. He went on to actively lobby for affirmative action and Mexican-American rights.

During his retirement in Albuquerque, Ximenes remained politically active, heading his neighborhood

association and fighting against the building of a nearby Wal-Mart. He also founded the Youth

Conservation Corps in New Mexico, according to Journal archives.“There are millions of people that he helped who have probably never heard his name,” Ricardo Ximenes said. “He always believed in the dignity of humans, that was his driving force. He was a progressive thinker; he still kept up with local politics.”