I write so that the desert landscape of my childhood can be heard as loudly as the urban chaos of my adulthood. Growing up in tiny, isolated corners of the Southwest – Holtville, California; Hatch, New Mexico; Poston, Arizona; and Blythe, California – all I dreamed of was escaping. Now, I more frequently long to return home.

At 17, I fled to UCLA (and a slew of parking tickets because I’d never seen a meter before and paying to park was an alien concept). In spring of 1995, my Chicana/o Studies professor suggested I attend Wings/Alas – the Latina Writers’ Workshop. There I discovered that my imaginary friends and all the conversations I’d been having with myself didn’t mean that I was crazy, they meant I was a writer. In Terri De la Peña’s “Confessions of an Evening Novelist” workshop, I started writing a novel about two cousins from Hatch, NM who move to Los Angeles for college in the early 90s when the city was in the midst of economic and racial turmoil. One struggles to fit in with other Chicana students, while the other joins a sorority. The complete manuscript is currently awaiting a publisher.

At Flight of the Mind the following year, I was prompted to write about my most wonderful memory. I chose the day my grandfather died because on that day he became my guardian angel and has watched over me all these years. It became my first published story, “Discordant Voices,” in Issue 18 of 34th Parallel.

My writing usually happens in binges – on weekends, winter break, spring break, and summer. I prefer putting pen to paper first, reading my work out loud, scribbling new ideas in the margins, and eventually committing the words to a digital page.

While I have been living in Los Angeles for more than 30 years, my roots are deeply embedded on dirt roads I once called home. Drawing on my experiences in 4-H and junior rodeo competitions, as well as relying on the photos my parents saved all these years, fragments of memory, videos courtesy of Mr. and Mrs. Brown, and occasionally attending CJRA events, I wrote a novel about a girl who loves horses more than people. Breaking Pattern was published by Inlandia Books in 2023.

For almost 20 years,  I spent my days with teenagers, taking them on various literary adventures. Despite the adolescent-inspired exhaustion, I managed to earn my MFA in Creative Writing at Antioch University. There I was mentored by amazing faculty and continue to rely on support from my Citron cohort as well as the constant encouragement from a few Orioles, some Sages, a Heliotrope, my Samohi colleagues, the UCLA Bruin crew, Women Who Submit, fellow Macondistas, my fellow CTG Writers’ Workshop scribes, my Class of 1990 sister wives, and my very understanding family.

In May 2023, I completed my PhD in Creative Writing and Literature at USC where I was a Wallis Annenberg Fellow. Much gratitude to department staff, faculty, my classmates, Latina PhD group and all the family and friends who kept me fed and encouraged me along the way. Community support has made all of my success possible.