In her 2015 collection, Bright Dead Things, a National Book Award finalist for poetry, Ada Limón writes of moving to Kentucky: “Confession: I did not want to live here.” It’s perhaps not a surprising sentiment coming from a coastally oriented person who was raised in Northern California, attended college in Seattle, and then spent over a decade in New York City.
But Limón and her husband, Lucas, have been in Lexington for seven years now and the effects of settling into this place are noticeable in her new book, The Carrying (Milkweed, Aug.). It’s a phenomenally lively and attentive collection replete with the trappings of living a little closer to nature. While Bright Dead Things is marked by a preponderance of light, such as images of fireflies and neon signs, The Carrying features numerous appearances by various trees, birds, and beetles. Limón also demonstrates a greater willingness to be explicit in naming colors, particularly green. “It’s crazy green, the whole book,” she says. “Lexington is the greenest place I’ve ever lived.” Similarly, where in Bright Dead Things, Limón tells a lot of stories and anecdotes, in The Carrying she is very present in her thoughts and experiences.
As it turns out, these shifts in focus have another, altogether unexpected source. While putting Bright Dead Things together, Limón was diagnosed with chronic vestibular neuronitis, which can cause bouts of vertigo. “If I’m really having vertigo, it’s pretty intense and I really have to focus,”
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“Evan Perez is a CNN Senior Justice Correspondent based in the Washington, D.C. Bureau, reporting on legal, crime, and national security issues.Perez principally covers the Russia investigation and helps lead the team that covers the Department of Justice. Most recently, Perez, along with CNN colleagues Jake Tapper, Carl Bernstein and Jim Sciutto, was awarded the White House Correspondence Association’s Merriman Smith Award in the broadcast…”
“…In September, the fourth-year Spanish student began selling personalized stickers on her Instagram account, @amoreymagia. Inspired by the stories and experiences of others, Alcazar said she turns personal photographs into artistic stickers for her customers as she hopes to touch the hearts of others during the uncertainty of the COVID-19 pandemic…”
(Courtesy Arizona Coyotes)
“The Arizona Coyotes announced that business executive and investor Xavier A. Gutierrez is the team’s new president, CEO and alternate governor.
According to the team, he is the first Latino president and CEO in NHL history.
He replaces Ahron Cohen, who was the team’s president and CEO for slightly less than two years. Cohen assumed that role when Andrew Barroway was the team’s majority owner in July 2018. Since then, Alex Meruelo has taken majority share of the franchise, and Cohen and the team parted ways early last month…”
“Typically during a recession, community college enrollment goes up as unemployed workers start looking for new skills. But that’s not happening this time around, signaling trouble for the economy and individual families going forward, particularly for lower-income students and students of color. Hari Sreenivasan reports as part of our ongoing series, “Rethinking College.”…”
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/how-the-pandemic-highlights-racial-disparities-in-higher-education
“…The bad news? This progress remains uneven. Nationwide, the proportion of Hispanics who graduate within six years is still 10 percentage points lower than the proportion of whites, according to the Education Department. The proportion who graduate in four is nearly 14 percentage points lower…”
“In 2020, we experienced the first pandemic in the last century. We saw a new social justice movement ignited. We heard loud calls for structural reform to achieve real equality.
In the Philadelphia region, Latinos, who make up 15 percent of the population, have suffered many losses: their jobs, economic stability, and their health and wellness…”
https://www.inquirer.com/news/philadelphia-camden-latino-achievements-goals-2020-20201230.html
“By some estimates, Mexico’s coronavirus cases are 17 times higher than officially reported….
“The numbers do not appear to reflect the death toll for certain,” Donna Patterson, an expert on Mexico’s health care system at Delaware State University, told me. “At the federal level, the numbers aren’t being reported accurately.”
https://www.vox.com/2020/5/13/21255012/coronavirus-covid-19-mexico-death-count-cases
“…In November, New Jersey’s governor, Phil Murphy, responding to a question about people growing tired of wearing masks, said, “You know what’s really uncomfortable and annoying? When you die.” (The mayor of the small town of Walton, Kentucky, did an even more confrontational version of this bit, in a Facebook post this spring that began, “Listen up dipshits and sensible people.”)…”
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/2020-in-review/the-best-jokes-of-2020
“…Much of Cardona’s recent tenure has focused on reopening the state’s schools during the pandemic. According to The Connecticut Mirror, a local newspaper, about one-third of the state’s public school students currently are able to attend school in person full time. Like many state and district leaders across the country, Cardona has been balancing demands from teachers unions and parents amid budget constraints…”
“…Alex Padilla — California’s Secretary of State, a loyal Newsom ally and a Latino in a state that has never had a member of that largest ethnic group serve as senator — was a top pick. Sure enough, as Newsom announced Tuesday, the Democrat from Pacoima is on his way to Washington.
But for many Californians — perhaps the majority — Padilla’s nomination is likely to elicit more curiosity than self-congratulation, less “I knew it” and more “who knew?”
If you’re acquainting yourself with Padilla for the first time, here are a few takeaways from his California CV…
https://calmatters.org/politics/2020/12/california-senator-padilla-harris-replacement/
“Tucked into the labyrinthine recesses of the American Museum of Natural History in New York, among 32 million specimens and cultural artifacts, is the slow loris. Rather, century-old specimens of the petite nocturnal primate from Southeast Asia, with whom Elora López-Nandam became quite acquainted. After spending a summer extracting and decoding their DNA while an undergrad at Columbia, López-Nandam turned her attention to another sluggish creature, the sea cucumber, and the conservation implications of its genetic diversity in the coral reefs near Fiji. Along the way, she decided to devote her life to…”
https://stanfordmag.org/contents/meet-elora-lopez-nandam
“UCLA plans to expand its Latino student population to a quarter of its enrolled student population in five years to qualify for additional federal grants, university administrators said in a campus-wide email Monday.
The university plans to become federally designated as a Hispanic-Serving Institution by 2025, which would make it eligible for various federal funds, Chancellor Gene Block and Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Emily Carter saidin the email. The university has created a task force with faculty and administrators to reach and maintain HSI status, they added…”
“WASHINGTON — President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. has selected Xavier Becerra, the Democratic attorney general of California, as his nominee for secretary of health and human services, tapping a former congressman who would be the first Latino to run the department as it battles the surging coronavirus pandemic…”
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/06/us/politics/xavier-becerra-hhs-health-secretary.html
“…Gómez-Quiñones, the co-founder and former director of the Chicano Studies Research Center, died Nov. 11 from congestive heart failure at the age of 80. He taught history at UCLA for almost 50 years. Gómez-Quiñones is remembered for his activism and empowering the Chicano community through his academic work…”
“I’m delighted to have Jacqueline join our team,” stated Cordoba Corporation Founder & CEO George L. Pla. “She brings tremendous public policy experience and an in depth understanding of diverse community needs and binational dynamics, which will assist our sectors in developing well planned, innovative, and equitable project solutions.”..”
“With colorful choreography, dancers shine a celebratory light on death.
Grupo Folklórico de UCLA will release an online video showcasing their annual Día de los Muertos celebration in December, and they finished filming the production Nov. 21 and Nov. 22. Through various traditional Mexican dances, the club hopes to emphasize the importance of community and honor lost loved ones. Featuring dances from Mexican states like Yucatán, Sinaloa, Veracruz, Nuevo León, Michoacán, Jalisco and Guerrero, the performance will be available for anyone to view on the club’s website. Beyond honoring the dead, club coordinator and fourth-year political science student Aranza Guzman said the club’s annual show allows members to honor their heritage…”
“Top Latino advocacy organizations are pushing for President-elect Joe Biden to appoint five Hispanics to Cabinet-level posts…”
“…Touching on the importance of her Mexican-American identity, Becky said, “When it comes to me and the decisions that I make in my career, I proudly wave both flags: Mexican and American. Like many children and grandchildren of immigrants — no matter where they’re from — we have learned from the ones before us what sacrifice and hard work looks like. I dedicate this award to all of our immigrant workers in this pandemic.” Becky added, “It’s because of my family, my abuelitos that I stand here today.” To learn more about Becky’s heritage, upbringing, and activism, read POPSUGAR’s recent cover story with the pop star…”
“WASHINGTON, Nov. 19, 2020 /PRNewswire/ — The Latino Corporate Directors Association will launch via Facebook Live the first of its kind California Boardroom Equity Scorecard and Tracker, a valuable resource for stakeholders and shareholders and the only publicly available tool that tracks the number of Latino/as on public company boards in California…”
“Mexico has recorded more than 100,000 deaths from Covid-19 – the fourth country to pass the sombre milestone.
According to Johns Hopkins University, the country has suffered 100,104 deaths since the pandemic began.
The news comes just days after the world’s largest Spanish-speaking country reported more than one million infections.
Government officials have acknowledged that the true toll from the pandemic is likely higher.
Only the US, Brazil and India have recorded more deaths than Mexico, which has a population of roughly 125 million. Its mortality rate of 9.8% is one of the highest in the world, according to Johns Hopkins data…”
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-55011840
