Growing up in East Palo Alto, an area south of San Francisco with one of the highest crime rates in the nation, Latina Silvia Vazquez remembers cringing when her friends and family called her a nerd. It was not considered cool to study. But now, the 17-year-old high school grad is off to a nerd’s […]
Editor’s Note: Devious Maids, which was much maligned based on the title and brief description alone, will not make it to TV screens this fall after all. Michael Fairman Soaps reports that ABC has decided not to pick up the show for its fall TV lineup. The show, created by Desperate Housewives producer Marc Cherry, […]
The picture seemed innocent enough: it was an attractive 14-year-old girl with her back to the camera, writing on the classroom whiteboard. But it was the text below the picture that caught cyberbullying educator Lissa Albert’s eye. It said, ‘look at that ass!’” Albert, who saw the posting on Facebook because she is “friends” with […]
Nine-year-old Erica Mitzel isn’t like most girls. She enjoys rough sports that involve getting muddy, tackling boys and playing rugby on an all-boys team. She tells people that if they want padding for protection, they should go play football. It is a matter of pride for her to prove she is just as tough—or tougher—than […]
When artist Mercedes Gertz got divorced 11 years ago, she quietly put her wedding pictures away in a drawer and slumped into a depression. Getting divorced was so painful, it was almost embarrassing to see the picture of herself at 25, a smiling, naïve young girl in a poofy white dress. But over lunch with […]
A few months ago, a parent at Trinity Lutheran Christian School, nestled in the Anaheim Hills between Disneyland and rugged wild canyons, discovered that another parent was a registered sex offender listed on the California State Attorney General’s Megan’s Law registry. He had been convicted of a sex act with a 14-year-old. The convicted parent […]
Most Americans today don’t think about where their food comes from—except that it better be cheap and convenient to buy. But the brilliance of the farmworker movement launched by Cesar Chavez more than 50 years ago is that he put a human face on our food. Suddenly, Americans became aware that getting those grapes, lettuce […]
All mothers worry about their children’s welfare. But for mothers of children with special needs, the anxiety of finding a good caretaker can be crushing. They have a particular burden of leaving their children in good hands to live safe and loving lives. Diana Rivera is now facing that challenge. She has been the primary […]
This post is in honor of Las Surrealistas, a group of female artists that include Frida Kahlo. As mothers we have many titles—nurturer, chef, cleaning lady, chauffeur, analyst, accountant, tutor, cheerleader, so-and-so’s mother, etc. But how many of us have not dreamed of escaping that reality into a fantasy world where there were no titles, […]