your mind is a tool that we have comlete power over and yet at the same time it is in control of us. countless thoughts pass before our minds eye without our permission. thoughts of negitivity, like thouse that tell us we are ugly or stupid, thoughts that isolate us from the people of this earth. these thoughts bring us out of the present moment and out our body into the past or the future. when our mind dose this we loose our connection to our selves and that of the world around us. but to realize that these thoughts are untrue we then gain power of the monent, we gain life, and the love of ourselves. one way to accomplish this through meditation,the practice of being present. you do not have to sit in a quiet place to meditate, you can apply this to every day actions, be present to the simple action of washing your hands, notice the sensation of the water rolling over your hands, be present to the movement of your hands and the smell of the sope your using. also being present to your in breath and your out breath can bring you into the present moment. daily acts of being present will take your attention away from your minds voice untill you have the power to silent this voice that we are a slave to. fight for a more contious self, and a more contious world.

My little sister the Horse woman
My sister is a horse woman. Since I can remember Simone has been infatuated with horses. At the age of two she would follow my mom around the house throwing a horse book at her and say “ Ride horsy ma, ride horsy!”
When you enter her room you are immediately struck with images and figurines of horses. Her walls are scattered with posters of them, but one in particular catches my eye every time I enter her room. it’s a powerful scene of a heard of horses charging thru a stream, each crashing hoof expelling water in all directions, mains and tails dance behind the beasts as they run. But what is most attractive about this image is the animals eyes, fierce and full of life just like Simone. Being a horse woman takes a ferocious personality dealing with such large and robust animals. One must show whose boss right off the bat.
The summer of 2004 my mother, brother and I accompanied my sister to the ranch. Bright Valley Farms is the name, a large wooden bored stands at the gates entrance, in purple are three silhouetted cowboys on horse back riding to the for ground as if coming to greet visitors of the ranch, and the name is printed underneath them. The ranch is split into two parts. One part is known as “down bottom” and the other is known as “up top”. Down bottom is the saddle station , the barn, where customers pay for their trail ride, a pasture, which is on a hill side, the large arena, and the horses accumulated shit piles. Up top are about eighty corrals, hey bails stacked about fifteen feet high, and a few mobile homes. Bright Valley is located off the 94 east at he 125 split. We arrived in the mid afternoon, a light breeze was descending from the west and Simone began her routine. She first gathers a few things from her tack shed: various combs and brushes of different shapes and sizes, and a bottle of ointment for Rebels eyes and ears. After gathering her tack she calls Rebel from the pasture. A chestnut horse perks its ears in our direction and turn it head, a strip of whit fur runs from his forehead down to his nose, three white sox don his left front and both hind legs. Once he recognizes whose calling him he slowly strols over to Simone, taking his time. At the Simone fixes him with a halter and a lead rope and walks him to a saddling post. Simone starts by inspecting his hoofs, gripping a tuft of hair right behind the joint that would be equivalent to that of our ankle and rises it in-between her thighs and squeezes it in place. With what looks like a bent flat head screwdriver, she begins to pick out dirt and pebbles out of the v-shaped craves of his hoofs. Next she begins brushing him, starting with a meal round cookie cutter comb she begins to remove numerous clods of caked on mud and heavy dirt. Switching to a thick haired brush Simone smoothes out all the rough spots and removes the fine dust that was left behind by the cookie cutter comb. Lastly simone combs Rebels mane and tail with a huge afro pick. She the fits him with a bare back pad and we are on our way. Simone, using both hands, grabs Rebel’s mane and swings her self up on his back with ease, no need of a stirrup or an assisting hand. We go at a walk, down the dirt road, passing horses in the pasture to the right, and to the left the barn. Right after the barn is the arena. The arena is the size of a football field, and it is closed in by a thick barred fence that rises up to about four feet. The floor is carpeted by wood chips, and there are three hurdles situated in the center of the arena, all varying in heights along with a circle of large orange cones standing beside one of the hurdles. I open the gate allowing Rebel and Simone passage. Wail Simone rides thru I close it behind her and the three of us settle our selves down on the fence like spectators at a small rodeo. I watch my sister take Rebel thru a few of his gates. First a walk, then a trot, and finoly into a gallop. Horse and rider moving in sink as though embodying a single entity. Simone carries herself with perfect form and the confidence of an experienced rider. Their rhythm never falters, like a foreign language they communicate with each other, concentration never halting, not for an instant, even as a passing horse is spooked and takes its owner for a ride. After performing a dozen laps Simone brings Rebel to rest in front of us. She tells us he is calm and is ready to be ridden by another. Genaro, my brother, hops off the fence and walks over to join next to the horse. Not showing the agility and grace that Simone demonstrates so diligently when mounting the horse, Genaro on the other hand resembles more of an unsteady drunk. Simone must assist him, squatting down and offering both interlaced hands as a step, helps Genaro mount. With one rein in Simone’s hand and the other end in Genaro’s, she leads him one lap around the arena. Rounding back once again stopping in front of my mom and I, Genaro hops off. It was now my turn. I too am clumsy, trying with much effort to climb aboard Rebels back. It takes many attempts but finally Simone comes to my aid and helps me hoist mount. Being full headed, I try and master the animal myself. I start off at a walk, and in one moment its easy going, then in the very next I lose control. Rebel, obviously sensing my inexperience takes me off guard and bolts. With each stride my bottom bounces further and further to his rear, each bounce expelling sound of unease until I ran out of horse for me to land on. This whole episode ends in a blink of an eye. I jump to my feet with great urgency for fearing Rebel may about-face and run me down. Now on my feet, I hop the fence and go join my brother and mother, both of which were making no effort to stifle their laughs.
My sister is a horsewomen. Her calling began at two, and her pathe was found at eleven, when she discovered the existence of the ranch. This quality she holds with such pride fills my heart with honor and pleasure for having the opportunity to be the brother of such an admiral human being.

this is a story of someone i lost. it will change over time as i rewrite it so if your interested read it a few times and i could be fun to find the canges


An Experience to a Lesson
Everyone has lessons to learn; some are sensational or inspirational, while others are hopeless or devastating. There was a hard lesson to learn from one of my own experiences, but first let me tell you about myself.
I was born at home, a block away from the North Park library on 31st. My family moved to South Park/Golden Hill when I was three years old. I have one brother and one sister who, like me, have also been home births. My brother was born at my grandparents’ house, where my parents were living at the time. My sister was born in the upstairs bathroom in the house we live in now. Growing up, my whole family slept in the same room and the same bed. I think because of this, we grew to be close and very open with each other. All my life, I have been able to come to my parents for anything, to support me in times of stress, or just to comfort me in times of need.
My ethnic backgrounds are Mexican, German, Spanish, Czech, and French. I equally embrace all of my ethnicities; I don’t like to say I am more of one thing and less of another, they are all a part of me. Religion has never been a big part of my life but spirituality has been. My dad is Catholic, and my mom is a metaphysician. She believes in creating one’s own reality and supernatural beings on the astro-plane. My dad may be Catholic, but he entertains other religious practices. For instance, he meditates about 30 minutes every morning and does Tai-Chi on Thursdays. My parents had let me take my own spiritual path. When I was in the first and second grade, I would pray to God, but in the third grade I decided I did not know what the creator of every thing is and to wait until I died to find out. Over the years, I have looked into other religions. What has influenced me most is Buddhism. I was drawn most to Buddhism by the way Buddhist monks bring compassion into every aspect of life. I also took on their idea of reincarnation, its an amazing idea that i value very much. I perceive life and interact with people in a compassionate way. I like to support people emotionally; almost all of my girlfriends have lived in unsupportive situations where I was their sole provider of emotional stability. This habit of mine has not always been a good idea. It sometimes took a lot out of me and left me drained. From this, I learned that if one is to help others, he must first help himself.
I have had a unconventional upbringing; my parents never hit me, and I was allowed to do anything I wanted except hurt people or destroy things that were not mine. This does not mean I was spoiled; I did not get everything I asked for. While I was growing up, my mom created a tight budget that taught me not to be materialistic. I have not bought clothes, except for underwear and socks, for about three years , and I have gotten most of my clothing for gifts or a thrift stor. I don’t have a lot of shoes; lately, most of my money has gone to concert tickets or food.
My parents have been together for 35 years. When they were in their early twenties, my dad was an alcoholic, and my mom smoked pot. In their mid twenties, they decided that if they were going to have a family, but they needed to be sober and have a good support system. They started on their sober path by going to a Buddhist monastery for a meditation retreat that lasted for two weeks. Since then they have been to numerous retreats and have been successfully sober ever since. They found their support system in co-counseling. Co-counseling teaches that emotions should be felt and not acted upon. A person expresses or “discharges” his feelings to a partner who is listening to him and dose not to get shucked into his pain and suffering or dose not relate or give advise, they only listen to them and try and keep them present to what they are feeling at the time, this allows them to think more clearly. My parents have practiced co-counseling all my life, and I have also joined a few classes and workshops.
When I was 15, I attended Charter School of San Diego with Sara Beagles. I met Sara after following her home on the bus. It was a bit of a creepy move on my part, but she did not seen to mind. Two weeks after that, we started dating. Sara , who liked to be called Kitty, loved me very much. At that point in my life, I had never experienced that much love from someone outside of my family. Kitty lived in a very stressful household. Her family criticized her and made fun of her for no apparent reason. I think because of the way she was treated at home, it made her feel vulnerable in social situations with people she did not know. She showed this by being rude or snappy. When I first met her, she was very critical of herself; she would put herself down and had a hard time accepting my compliments. I decided to try and bring her out of this self-destructive way of thinking by giving her compliments more often and saying that the only opinion she should listen to is mine because it is positive and is coming from someone who loves her. The day she met me, she broke up with her boyfriend, Grant Michelin. They had been dating on and off for five years. The three of us would get together at Gulls games; Kitty’s dad had season tickets. When I first met Grant, he came off as being a laid back, funny kind of guy, but as time went on, he started to become jealous of my relationship with Kitty. Grant started telling Kitty’s mom that we were having sex and threatened to get her into more trouble if she would not hang out with him. He also threatened to kill her, but she never told me this. I had to learn it later from my sister.
In the second week of September 2003, Grant strangled Kitty to death in his home. My life was brought to a standstill for a week. I did not go to school; I was not eating very much; some nights I would sit in my driveway hoping it was all a dream, and at any moment Kitty would walk up the street to come meet me. For about two months, I strongly grieved my loss. I was not sure of how to deal with it. I had an immense amount of support from my family, and I was also going to therapy. I felt that I needed to do something more. One night I got a newspaper that detailed Grant’s interrogation. He explained how he committed the murder. After reading it, I was overflowing with rage. I went to my local liquor store, bought a pack of cigarettes, and went walking around my neighborhood. On my walk, I noticed that most of my suffering was coming from the great anger I had for Grant. I decided that the most straightforward way for me to heal this emotional wound was to forgive Grant. At first, the thought seemed impossible and unbearable. To forgive him felt like shooting myself in the foot, but then I realized that, if I forgave him unconditionally and without reason, then it would not justify what he did, it would be a true way to forgive. Once I forgave Grant, it was like a large weight was lifted off my heart, and I was able to breath freely.
This lesson was most essential for me to mourn purely. Though it may have been a tragic event, something good has come of it. I now have the power of forgiveness, and it allows me to be closer with the people around me. This lesson cannot be handed over; I believe it must be learned.