Boca Cerrada: Who's Keeping Score Anyway

October 21^st. Wednesday. Later, later.

I can’t keep my mouth shut to save my life.

“Me duelen las piernas from crossfit!”

                 “I’m starving.”

                              “They’re taking too long at the pharmacy.”

“I don’t have a headlight.”

           “Tengo sueño!”

This month my goal was to keep my mouth shut - boca cerrada - long enough to be able to notice joy and beauty around me.  Did I fail yesterday?  Yep!  I’m not perfect.  I’ll try again today.

I think the only time I kept my mouth shut yesterday was to watch the Compel Webinar on writing.  My husband gifted me a membership to this writing program and I’m thrilled about it.  Thank you for believing in me, my love!  I did pause the video every 3 minutes to summarize it for him.  It’s up to you if you’ll count the three minutes as boca cerrada. 

I didn’t get any writing done as a result.  Sometimes I will fail, but I have to be okay with that.  I have to be okay with trying again.  The best things have come from trying again.  My husband, my children, my writing, my faith. 

Haber que pasa hoy que es nuevo día.  Let’s see what happens today since it is a new day.

Have you set a goal and stumbled in the process?  You are not a failure.  Today is a new day!  Let’s try this again con la boca cerrada!

Sobriety.  My Family. I pray we don't stop trying.

The blessings of mended relationships and trying again. 

Boca Cerrada: The Joy in Being Unearthed

October 20^th. Tuesday. Boca Cerrada, Corazón Abierto (Mouth Closed, Heart Open).

I’ve heard a handful of writers say that writing chose them, but in my case, I chose it. 

Writing was something that unearthed me, at a very young age, when I felt buried too far down to ever want to come out.  Writing was an escape when I struggled with suicide, cutting, anxiety and postpartum depression. 

I resuscitated myself, on paper, each time my thoughts and actions led me down a path that was never fit for me.

Terry Gross of NPR loves to interview artists because she says, “[Artists are] the people we designate to open up their lives for examination so that we can understand better who we are.  They offer up their own stories like what Updike would call ‘specimen lives.’ Examples of what it’s like to be human.” 

I believe my struggle was intentional and my outlet was purposeful.  Where writing used to be an escape, now it is a lifestyle, a necessity and a catalyst for others to find hope in what they must endure. 

Whether I’m good at writing or not, I’ve sought after it with my whole heart.  I earned a degree in English that took me 10 years to obtain.  I wrote when I had nothing left inside of me to offer the world. 

I wrote when God responded to my weakness with, “Just keep going.” 

Writing means so much to me.  I have newly promised to use it to help someone else unearth their own gift(s).  I pray that my honesty shines a light on what you might be struggling through.  Your story and mine holds purpose.

Do you know what your gift is?  How are you using your gift to encourage or inspire someone else?  Are you quiet long enough to allow your gift to surface?  Today, practice con la boca cerrada.

Boca Cerrada: The Joy In Waiting

October 19th. Monday. Late.

Ya te dije que no.  And I'm tired of repeating myself.

The answer is the same today as it was yesterday and last week and last month. Before you ask, I want to blurt out "no" when I see you because I know what you will ask.

No. I am not pregnant yet and each time you ask and offer a wealth of advice, it reminds me that I am failing my husband and my family.

"Oh, but you already have two kids," is the most hurtful phrase to surface from a mouth.  It wouldn't matter if I had one or four, the feeling remains the same.  My husband and I would like a child and I cannot carry one at this time.  There is much to learn in that.  To find joy in the midst of waiting is a quiet peace.

Therefore, I will allow my life to be the birth and rebirth of something extraordinary.  I will allow our new garden to surround me with abundant life as I watch our pinto beans and watermelon vines crawl up our front window.

I sit in quietude, a lesson in humility.  Where I take for granted that I am a woman capable of creating life inside me in the form of a child, I must notice that I create life in my home when I choose to love what I have been gifted.  I am surrounded with life to remind me that it comes in all forms.  God makes sure of that.

Tonight, with my boca cerrada, I sit on my porch, my legs crossed, my back against the writing dock (porch swing) and my eyes averted toward the heavens.  I see the moon staring back at me; it always shows up.  My perspective might be skewed by the clouds, but each and every night the moon shows up.  I take a deep breath and wait.

What are you waiting for and how do you find joy in the waiting con la boca cerrada?

Onlookers at moon observation night.  McAllister Park.
Carolina Hinojosa-Cisneros, 2015

Boca Cerrada: In Observation of Joy

Boca cerrada means mouth closed.  I like to talk.  I talk a lot.  This month I want to take a step back from being reactive or dismissive because my mouth gets in the way of the opportunities I have to reflect on life's joys.  I want to share with you the joys I find.

I am thrilled to see what this exercise can open up for my perspective on life and my constant desire to notice the joy when I feel that there may not be any left.  I want to shine a light on that this month (October 18th - November 17th).  Will you join me?

My porch swing.  The writing dock.
Carolina Hinojosa-Cisneros, 2015

October 18th. Sunday. Early.

I awoke before my husband and son this morning.  Instead of rolling under the covers for a few more minutes of rest, I get out of bed, wrap a sweater around myself, slip on my chanclas and head outside. It is my first taste of a Texas autumn. With the wind zigzagging through my toes I slowly pull the mangera from its snake like coil and water the matas that adorn my front porch.  I have become all the matriarchs in my family that value rising early to tend to the life in the yard before tending to the life in the house.

I notice a new budding of tiny red and orange florecitas atop a plant I have newly planted.  It must be thriving from the soil where it is enterrada.  It was in a pot before and would not give this kind of show until it was buried deep into the soil.  Like the plant, I too must be grounded in rich soil in order to thrive.

I recoil the mangera and sit on my porch swing, which I like to call the Writing Dock.

I hear the train chuh chuh chuh and then its horn con fuerza on an iron track not visible from my yard.  I've never seen the train near my home, but just up South Flores Street there is the train that runs near the Gravelmouth Gallery.  I assume it is this train that is causing me to want to warm my cafecito and imagine the era of industrialized transportation.

The bing bing bing of the bell from Mission San José announces the beginning of a Sunday morning Spanish sermon.  Visions of my childhood chime in reminding me of the veils my grandmother and I wore to mass on Sundays at El Carmen on Martinez-Losoya Road.  My mind lingers on how we fear the veil, forgetting that we once wore it- some of our elderly still do. (That's for a later post, que no?)

It is nearly time to wrap up my journaling to go inside and make breakfast.  I am thankful for my writing time this morning and for morning sounds with memories that attach themselves to those sounds.

In what ways do you crave solitude and what do you notice in those moments of soledad?  What joy can you gain from being still and taking on today with la boca cerrada?
  

Mano de Leon, Cockscomb Flower.
Carolina Hinojosa-Cisneros, 2015

On Watching

On most days the sky
radiates a candid flair
anchors of not so
fast this time

Writing Truths

I had a great evening with my sister, son, and husband. Gathered at the dinner table our conversation led us to the indigenous languages of Nahuatl, Yacutec Maya, and Purépecha. We candidly spoke about what it's like when you're American and one of your parents was born on foreign soil, what that means as far as identity and connection and how people treat you differently on both turfs even though either will go to great lengths to prove otherwise. 

We spoke of travel, education, and culture.  My son worked on his mathematics and reading homework.  We asked him if he learned about Columbus.  He said he had learned a bit about Columbus, but the teachers were sure to tell him that Columbus did not discover America.  A fact that I was proud was being taught to my fifth grader.  This could also be respective to the area in Texas where we reside.

It was a beautiful evening as we wrapped up the conversation and the laughter when we took it outside to water the matas (plants).  It reminded me of being at my grandmothers.  How each evening we'd spend long hours at her home and she'd take us outside in one sweeping gesture so that she could water her dear plants.  The conversation always turned lighthearted and carefree as she spoke about different plants and different animals that attacked her plants.  

I found myself in a pleasant déjà vu last night.  I am becoming the matriarch in small and careful steps as God wills it.  Stories continue to riddle my lips and l find it is my duty to keep these stories alive in the best way I know how, speaking and writing my truth.  

Pajarito, A Storyteller

I find random items in my yard while regando las matas. I imagine the birds make their way to my fence and bring stories of other yards along with them. They drop pieces of plastic, ties, ropes, nails, cardboard, leaves, pecans, grass clippings, branches, and seeds.

Each item is an adventure entertained by these pajaros as they make their way around the neighborhood. On occasion, I find a feather or two. Perhaps, a territorial move to prove that they own a particular piece of the barrio. Stealing stories for each other and conquering tales of other birds, they litter the ground with new cuentos that can be told en la mañanita. 

“Y los pajaritos cantan, la luna ya se metió...”