California

Made for You and Me: Going West, Going Broke and Finding Home

andrea — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 08:00:00 +0000

I’m sharing this book with everyone I know. Caitlin Shetterly’s Made for You and Me: Going West, Going Broke and Finding Home is a strong memoir about a young couple going broke in the recession and it gives readers the satisfying feeling of walking around someone else’s shoes for 250 pages. We’re all connected by some basic humanity and a good memoir reinforces this connection as we don the cloak of another with ease.

Caitlin Shetterly’s Made for You and Me doesn’t simply resonate for us at the level of humanity. It is us. Within the first few pages I learned we are the same age and as she discussed her career moves, life plans and even the love of her pets, I felt we were kindred spirits. Though this may be true, I must attribute this to Shetterly’s writing style more so than the potential that we are long lost siblings. One key element she mentions after a few lengthy tales of her family pets is that writers often neglect the importance of pets in a tale, or even in a life. She refuses to subscribe to this and keeps her promise throughout the tale by consistently accounting for the pets’ needs and whereabouts at every step of their journey.

The pets aren’t the whole story, however. Caitlin Shetterly and her husband Dan Davis struggle through mid-thirties job searches, the want for something more, and the need for some basic success amid an economic recession that brings it all to a screeching halt. The pair is an example of the hidden layers beneath the CNN-drafted economic tag lines and phrases pundits regurgitate at us daily. They are the living, breathing case that represents us.

What’s so endearing about this book is that not only do you recognize the story and eagerly peel back its layers, but you also come to feel the very real emotional stresses that television news stories are leaving out. Particularly moving in Shetterly’s storytelling is her ability to frame her husband through the nuanced lens of gender expectations. These two critically educated people know that they’re held to ideological gender standards and in many places in their lives seem to balk at the hegemonic practices that secure them. Yet, Shetterly’s descriptions of her husband’s transformation strikes at the very core of how masculinity is a powerful framing force that deeply impacts the psyche of men and women alike.

You feel for both of them, but what’s moving the story is the way her gentle, honest tone captures the nuance we need to see in order to understand this is us, this is how we plan our lives, this is what we want for ourselves.

Shetterly frames the story around my childhood favorite, the Laura Ingalls Wilder series, Little House on the Prairie. Little House’s Manifest Destiny, coupled with the lyrics of “This Land is Your Land,” act as a critique woven throughout the story of their financial struggle, and her tale becomes a memoir with more take-away meaning than most. The mirror she holds up to us reminds us that the American Dream is complex, and that the drive within you has as much potential as a Horatio Alger success story as well as the potential to break you with exhaustion, crisis, trepidation and economics. It is this paradox that is particularly comforting and engaging about Shetterly’s story. Her recession tale sheds light on more than just a tough economy. We often argue that the ideology of capitalism and the American Dream have been disrupted, and we do not live in the world, economic or otherwise, that our parents or grandparents did. Shetterly’s work shows us that the resulting reality is complex and dynamic and many of us are struggling within it.

Basic ideas about family, support, goals, ambitions, and working hard are surely themes across the surface of Caitlin Shetterly’s Made for You and Me: Going West, Going Broke and Finding Home. But Shetterly also takes those themes and moves them from trite assumptions about how we are to live and packs them full of the struggle they cause us, inside and out, when we’re simply fighting for survival.

Written by: Dr. Julie E. Ferris, March 8th 2011

No Place for a Puritan: The Literature of California's Deserts

admin — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 17:01:00 +0000

Edited by Ruth Nolan

Heyday Books

Possibly some magnetic force field that beckons people to its promises of adventure, wealth, and sun blazed days, there is a pull toward California. Be it a fight for survival, a lost treasure, or ability to inspire, California and its sacred deserts are full of mysticism and brighter futures. On the other hand, California's offerings are in no way a given. The obstacles, being weather related or competitive in nature, are likely to break a person's soul. Being able to say you have survived it's land is almost like saying you have won the game; you took a chance with death and you have proven your worth. No other state has inspired so many forms of art. Iconic by design, this land is the perfect backdrop, and main character, for many written works.

The poetry, prose, and excerpts in No Place for a Puritan prove the obsession that humankind has for life on the edge in pursuit of some greater good while in the desert. The glimpses into desert life this anthology contains are of the truest embodiment of human existence; we live to struggle, and struggle to live.

Writers seem to find a freedom in the stillness that extreme quiet in the desert provides. W. Storrs Lee mentions the antagonist the desert provides in an excerpt of his 1963 novel, The Great California Deserts. How convenient and true is his statement. How ideal to set your characters in such a place where even vegetation can't pull though!

By including authors of long ago and authors of present standing, Nolan has encapsulated the trance that the desert can have on any point of time. An excerpt of Hunter S. Thompson's cult classic, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, brings to mind the drug-addled culture that the Californian desert hides.

The beautiful stories, recollections, and poems shared here are all too beautiful to name. The romanticism amongst trailer parks and treacherous landscape only encourages the reader to see it for oneself. Ruth Nolan has done a spectacular job gathering the pieces contained in this book to point out all of the deserts' offerings and takings to those who dare to encounter it. The desert still stands a mystery; centuries after humankind started writing about its splendors.

Another decadent plus to this anthology is that I've been reading it during one of the coldest spells in recent history. There is nothing better than the warmth fueled by the reminders of the sun and the land it graces on a continual basis. I miss the desert even more now.

Written by: A. Mariel Westermeyer, March 13th 2010

Gringa: A Contradictory Girlhood

admin — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 01:02:00 +0000

By Melissa Hart

Seal Press

When Melissa Hart was eight years old, her mother fell in love with Patricia, the woman who drove the school bus. Soon, Hart’s mother left her husband and moved in with Patricia, taking her children with her. Within months, however, Hart learned a heart-wrenching lesson when she discovered that the family courts of the 1970s didn’t regard a woman involved in a same-sex relationship as a fit mother. Hart's dad was given custody, and her mom was left to see her children every other weekend and a few weeks in the summer.

Living in the upscale Manhattan Beach with her upper class father and, after a short interlude, her new stepmother, the author longed for her too-seldom visits to her mother in Oxnard—a place not only geographically distant, but as culturally dissimilar as two places in Southern California could be. This split in her reality left the young Hart understandably confused about her own identity. In Oxnard, she was attracted to the culture of the predominantly Latino neighbors: their lively parties, delicious food, and the warmth that she perceived to be missing from her Manhattan Beach home. As she grew older, Hart longed to emulate her mother’s sexuality. But much to her chagrin, Hart discovered she was attracted to boys, and as much as she yearned to belong to the Latino culture, she was an outsider there as well.

While the writing is skilled and evocative, and the scenes are vivid, Hart gives us a book that doesn’t quite deliver a satisfying, cohesive story. Despite the themes that she revisits (one of the major themes of Gringa is the search for belonging by a girl whose mother was cruelly ostracized from her children by the legal system), her account lacks a defining arc. In some ways, this is not surprising. After all, this is a memoir, and real life is, by nature, episodic. What marks a skilled memoirist is her ability to sift through the events of her life and distill the story. Unless this is accomplished, her readers will ask themselves, “Why should I read this?”

While I was keenly interested in the problems Hart encounters as a result of her mother’s absence, her experiences as the daughter of a woman in a lesbian relationship, and the challenges she faced living with her often angry father and her new stepmother. I was far less interested in her account of getting a new car, her brief high school acting career, or her interlude as a student in Santa Barbara. A more judicious editor would likely have advised taking much of this material out because, while the writing is competent, it fails to overcome the problems in these chapters: a lack of narrative momentum, a clear relationship with the central story of the memoir, and a compelling conflict that makes the reader care.

Hart’s memoir is important in that it adds to our understanding of the impact of anti-gay prejudice and the bitter price children of lesbian and gay parents have been forced to pay; this is evoked with great emotional resonance in the book. Unfortunately, the strength of the memoir is diluted by the inclusion of material that seems extraneous.

Written by: Elaine Beale, February 25th 2010

Wherever There's a Fight: How Runaway Slaves, Suffragists, Immigrants, Strikers and Poets Shaped Civil Liberties in California

admin — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 09:00:00 +0000

By Elaine Elinson, Stan Yogi

Heyday Books

On June 16th, 2008 Phyllis Lyon and Del Martin made headlines as the first same-sex couple legally married in the state of California. The couple, who first met in the ‘50s, spent the majority of their adult lives advocating for equal rights for homosexual couples and lived to see their goal realized. Although Californians have fought the battle for same-sex marriage most visibly in the past ten years, activists such as Lyon and Martin have been addressing the issue of discrimination against homosexuals in California for several decades. Lyon and Martin’s story is just one of the many civil rights struggles highlighted in Wherever There’s a Fight, an anthology of activism in the Golden State.

Each story carries with it a delightful tinge of tension, and as I read I found myself anxiously awaiting to hear how ordinary citizens had confronted their various struggles. Elinson and Yogi, both writers with close professional ties to the California ACLU, document civil liberties struggles from abortion rights to workers rights to the right to dissent. The stories demonstrate how many Californians became lifelong activists after fighting for rights that so vitally affected their access to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Ed Roberts was such a person. Roberts was infected with polio as a boy, leaving him paralyzed from the neck down. After his mother lobbied the local school board to allow her son to graduate high school (the principal had denied Roberts a diploma because he was unable to complete the district’s physical education and drivers education requirements) Roberts decided he would attend college to secure a meaningful livelihood. In 1962 he became the first severely disabled student admitted to the University of California at Berkeley, although the administration was unaware when they admitted him that the straight-A student was disabled. Thus began a fight for equal access and protection that Roberts would fight for the rest of his life that made California into the birthplace of the disability rights movement in the United States.

As the fight for civil rights becomes more visible, and more progress is gained, perhaps a second edition of this wonderful book will include some exciting new stories. I can’t wait!

Written by: Janice Formichella, January 13th 2010

El Reflejo

admin — Sat, 16 May 2009 10:02:00 +0000

By Cal State Long Beach students

Long Beach is unlike any other city in Southern California; it is a place where both million dollar homes and low-income housing co-exist within mere miles of each other, it is suburban and urban, it’s an oppressive, concrete jungle that happens to be surrounded by picturesque beaches, but most compelling, perhaps, is the eclectic mix of people that call the city home. Long Beach is a true representation of the term “all walks of life.” Inhabitants include blond beach babes, immigrants from every country, a large black community, the ultra-wealthy, hordes of homeless, a thriving gay community, and a massive Latino culture, which should come as no surprise seeing as how forty percent of the city is Latino. It is these last two segments of Long Beach society that most concern the staff of El Reflejo, a small, self-published zine compiled by students of Cal State Long Beach.

El Reflejo, which means “the reflection” in Spanish, is quite literally a direct reflection of the lives of its writers. Not all of the zine’s staff members are Latino, but many of them are members of campus organizations such as FUEL (Future Underrepresented Educated Leaders) and La Raza Student Association. The content featured in the zine comes in all forms: poems, essays, confessions, drawings and all of it manages to be optimistic, angry, idealistic, tragic, and hilarious, as only young people are apt to be. Though small in size, the publication makes a big impact for students who would otherwise go unheard; either through their own self-imposed silence or because no forum previously existed for them to be heard.

There are two sections guaranteed to be in each issue: Jotos Anonimos and Mojados Anonimos, which are essentially sections cordoned off for writings pertaining to being queer and undocumented; writers can remain anonymous if they choose. Yadira Arroyo, a Chicano studies major and women’s studies minor, is one of El Reflejo’s most outspoken writers and does not pussyfoot her around her intentions for the zine. Arroyo said:

“Personally, I want to smash that macho/hyper-nationalistic stereotype of Chicano activists. I want to replace it with one of love, as corny as that sounds. Love for who you are and where you come from, but not blind love. Despite public perception, Latinos do not inherently come from a place of malice, which is often assumed in the cases of ‘lawless’ undocumented immigrants, for example. Our culture can certainly be ugly at times, but in the end we are just trying to love and survive.”

The zine, which is small and humble… and xeroxed, is a true labor of love. The publication is in no way funded by Cal State Long Beach and none of its eight core staff members get paid. Essentially, it is through the sale of nachos, hot dogs, beer, and liquor at what seems to be a constant stream of fundraisers that El Reflejo gets the meager funds it needs to continue chugging forward into its unsure future.

What began as nothing more than an idea being kicked around at a 2005 student retreat, has since blossomed into a four-year-old publication that gives students such as Pablo Ildefonso, a Chicano studies major, the chance to finally make their presence known on a campus lacking in diversity. “We exist on this campus, which is something the University tends to forget when they generalize the student experience here. Our experiences as Latinos on this campus aren’t known very well and my voice needs to be heard if there are people going through a similar things,” Ildefonso said.

Student publications have famously been the one place where young people can voice their concerns and opinions about the unsure world they are living in. It is only through the blood, sweat, and tears of the unrepresented segment of the Cal State Long Beach student body that this type of alternative media outlet can exist—and that’s not a bad thing. According to Arroyo, the staff’s efforts to keep the zine going and their pained published writings are a record of their existence on campus and it is because of their efforts that people will be able to look back and know how progressive Latino students were managing in a less-than-accepting world.

“This is our voice, our affirmation,” said Arroyo. “We produce work and it validates us in a way that society doesn’t. Mainstream, white-American, classist culture is supposed to be the stamp of approval, but with El Reflejo, we have the opportunity to nourish a beautiful arena—one that’s free from the outsider’s gaze.”

Written by: Tina Vasquez, May 16th 2009

Lonely Planet: Los Angeles & Southern California (2nd Edition)

admin — Tue, 13 May 2008 17:54:00 +0000

By Andrea Schulte-Peevers, Amy C. Balfour, Andrew Bender

Lonely Planet

Writing guide books for cities as widely visited as Los Angeles can be challenging. One is faced with the question: what’s left to write about? All the usual suspects make an appearance in the _Los Angeles & Southern California _entry of Lonely Planet’s guide series: Universal Studios, Disneyland, Rodeo Drive, the Ivy. For readers – most notably L.A. and SoCal first-timers - the descriptions of these California icons are servicable, though they don’t offer anything new.

As is expected with a guidebook outfit as thorough as Lonely Planet, there are loads of unexpected sites and entries, as well: the Museum of Tolerance, a must-see and much-needed antidote of reality for the artifice that can be pervasive in Los Angeles; a fun stop for history buffs, the Richard Nixon Presidential Library is also highlighted – which promises a revamped Watergate exhibit; for the science buff as well as the architectual fetishist, the Salk Institute, housed in a classic Louis Kahn building, is a popular stop; and entertainment junkies who tire of the film and television-oriented Los Angeles can travel to San Diego, which is home to the Old Globe Theaters that host the summer Shakespeare festivals (though fans of the Bard are cautioned that other works are also performed).

Like other Lonely Planet guides, this entry could’ve had more photographs; though there is a copious amount of maps, highlighting sites, restaurants, and hotels. There are four pages of features sites, all in attractive color pics. Another section, dubbed “SoCal Speaks” gives various locals (including Los Angeles mayor, Antonio Villaraigosa) a chance to trumpet their favorite part of Los Angeles. It’s an interesting and harmless section, though more pictures of the city and the surrounding areas would be more helpful.

Another issue with the guide, though this could be attributed to the city it’s reviewing, is how celebrity-mad the authors seem to be. Los Angeles is more than just superstar-country and the authors’ constant name-dropping (even going as far as using the tabloid-friendly “first-name only” style – i.e. “Britney, Leo”) only add to the cliché. That said, the book has a lot going for it, as long as readers get into the spirit of the kind of vacation a trip to Los Angeles is. It’s not a cultural eye-opener that a jaunt to Sri Lanka or Kenya would be. And while it’s easy to deride California as the cultural wasteland of the United States, a look through this book would set any narrow-minded prejudice straight.

The authors take a strong and critical look at Los Angeles in the opening sections of the book, giving readers socio and economic background information – an important point the book makes is that the richest and the poorest in the country live in Los Angeles. Rougher areas - like Compton and South Central - get mentions, though understandably, they’re not as highly recommended as Beverly Hills or Santa Monica. It’s commendable of the authors to mention these underserved areas; there is a great mention of the Watts Towers, and the authors make a point of not glossing over the Watts race riots.

Another difficulty the authors tackle with aplomb is the sheer volume of information available. There’s a lot to see in Los Angeles and Southern California, and there are a lot of places to eat at and stay. The suggestions are helpful – they are broken down by area and price-range (though, potential visitors are warned in the opening section that Los Angeles is a prime destination for budget-travelers). The descriptions of the restaurants and hotels are personable and often include shout-outs to the owners, if they made impressions on the authors. There are also suggestions for shopping, and the authors make sure that out-of-the-way and unique shops get mentions as well (you can dress up like a storm trooper or a Klingon after a spree at It’s a Wrap – a shop that sells wardrobe castoffs from TV and movie studios).

Gay and lesbian travelers can also use this book as a resource – though the information is pretty limited and there are loads of books that cater specifically to LGBT travelers. Still, there is a good amount of information about gay-friendly areas and businesses. As expected with the limited amount of space devoted to the subject, most of the information is not really all that new (West Hollywood is gay? You’re kidding).

Traveling to California, of course, includes trips to the beach – the authors realize that the water would be a major spot for vacationers and do an excellent job in this respect. Beaches are well described, and activities (such as surfing and fishing) are highlighted in specific beaches that are best suited. Also, for surfing virgins, various surfing-lessons are listed, with prices.

A trip to California can be daunting to plan when faced with all that there is to do. Lonely Planet has mapped out all there is to do in Los Angeles and surrounding Southern California in an easy-to-read guidebook, which lets readers plan out their own itineraries. The sights are carefully separated according to location – so that when planning a trip, it’s easy to check-off what you’re going to visit. Major sights, such as Disneyland, get an exhaustive description and helpful tips (pricing, lodging, and eating). For more adventurous travelers, there are great points to visit as well. That this guidebook is very versatile isn’t a surprise when looking at other excellent entries in the Lonely Planet’s library.

Written by: Peter Piatkowski, May 13th 2008