Essays and Elements
Music is often a time machine, a magical transport that can instantly take our minds and hearts to places we cherish in our memories and souls. Al Hurricane, Jr. and his family have created many songs over the decades that have transported me back to those moments in my grandmother’s tiny kitchen in San Jose More Farewell to a New Mexico legend
Over the last week, I’ve been hearing from so many people who have been sharing fond memories of the old “Mis Crismes” tradition after I posted a video about it on Cuentos y Corazón. In short, children who lived in tiny villages in New Mexico and southern Colorado used to go door-to-door to their neighbors More The “Mis Crismes” tradition lives on in this tiny community
This week a video showing a Denver food inspector pouring bleach on a vendor’s table of food went viral, which elicited angry responses towards the city and inspector. People called for the inspector to be fired, charged and arrested. It turns out the vendor, according to the city, has repeatedly skirted rules that require food More What does that viral bleach video reveal about the truth?
This is weird now. What happened? I look in the mirror and don’t recognize myself, although I still have this internal picture of me in my twenties—dark brown hair and about thirty pounds lighter. No gray. Sometimes I’ll catch clips of my television news reporting online, and the guy on camera looks more like a More Being middle aged is weird, but whatever. Nevermind.
Years ago when I was 16, my father and I were caught in a terrible and intense storm while on a backpacking trip in northern New Mexico. The rain and hail were coming down extremely hard, like millions of white nails and the lightning was striking all around us like wicked fingers. Every few seconds, More When the unexpected storms come
Out of the thousands of news stories I’ve done, there is one in particular that is my favorite and which continues to resonate with people. In 2017, I put together this brief story about the Spanish-speaking people of northern New Mexico and southern Colorado for Hispanic Heritage Month. My grandmother even made an appearance. I More A side passion project: Cuentos y Corazón
This month, for the first time, I was locked out of my Facebook account and prohibited from sending messages and making posts. What did I do wrong? Journalism. The automatic moderation system flagged a post of mine from April in which I posted a news story I did about a school bus aide seen on More Facebook permits tons of AI image spam but restricts my journalist page for reporting actual news
I once called Twitter the nicotine of journalism. Twitter became more like hard alcohol for me in early 2023. My addiction to the site became a mental health problem as I constantly sought out my Twitter dopamine buzz from sunrise to sunset. My days were awash with an endless stream of digital poison always on More One year clean and sober from Twitter
I’ve never done LSD, but after getting a 30 minute dose of the Vision Pro headset, I feel like I’ve been to a different dimension that is absolutely wonderful and seemingly foreboding because of its potential to ensnare, deceive and captivate our attention. As I write about this device, let me give some historical context More Late to the party Vision Pro review: It s like a sober acid trip
When I was a young, impressionable college kid, Ricardo was a deeply positive influence on my life and an absolutely terrible role model, which made him fun to be around. He’d probably get a kick out of this posting about him. As he would read it, he’d likely get a little offended and hurt and More Farewell to the The Man of Mesilla