November 6, 2017

Santa Barbara, California

I was so exhausted last night, I fell asleep before midnight! But that meant I was awake by 3 a.m. and again at 5 a.m. and finally just got up and did my Chopra meditation. Finally went to have breakfast. At the Upham Hotel breakfast is fancier than at the Marriott Courtyard! I had a delicious bowl of oatmeal and a hard boiled egg, and a cranberry scone. I worked on my presentation and then too soon, Magda who took us to the UCSB campus to visit Ellie’s class on Chicana Writers. The crisp early morning air in the hotel gardens impelled us to get photographed. A fellow resident volunteered and took our photo.

The campus is as I remember…but not! New buildings–including a new Alumni Center, a new parking garage, and somewhat spiffier areas…but it is still the same campus where you need to watch out for bicycles, still the same young people walking across campus with backpacks full of hope, still the same bulletin boards with posted events, still the flowers and bushes and hedges placed just so by design. We arrive to the class early but we hear the music…my favorite song: Las Nubes! I get emotional hearing the tejano classic, what some have called the Chicanx national anthem. Ellie introduces me and I present my power point.