I’ll let you in on a family inside joke. Anyone with the last name Flores is “uno de nuestros primos” — one of our cousins. Over the years, it has extended to mean anyone who is Mexican in the States, broadened to the whole of Latin America. My mother may have tried to instill a distrust of Puerto Ricans in me, but Latinidad is anyone with affective and affected understanding of the diaspora. 
         When Charlie — and Bella by extension — approached me about writing a response to Sal’s work, it felt like a moral imperative. 
         Chicanismo is an open wound. It informs the years of heartbreak and friendships torn up over the fact that my family wasn’t totally born “here.” Taco pills. “Illegal” immigration. Donkey legs. Side eyes. Frowns. Scowls. Blatant disrespect of your garden and jungle variety. Even now: my mom may be getting “racism’d” at work. I’m not good at explaining how deeply any of it hurts because the wound never truly heals. Soul wound — as they call it.
         Chicanismo is an open wound. I cannot write about these experiences immediately after they happen. My writing process requires me to sit alone with my thoughts, and well, that just leads to more problems than answers. It’s how I wrote for the Freeman family — with my girlfriend on the esplanade park bench at 11:15 pm, legs curled up for warmth in the brisk March air. Someone in a black pickup truck yelled a slur at us, I think. 
         Chicanismo is an open wound. My mom started reading a book some time ago about how Mexico would be a world power within the next 100 years. She was a little bit skeptical, to say the least. To have the hyphen in your identity means you feel powerless most days and exhausted when the power shifts into your own hands. To cry over people whom you have never met being torn away from each other in a courthouse. To know that at any point, it could be me, too. To escape to either side of the continent would be to experience more of the same. Latinidad tells us that safety is something you find together, and EE.UU. tells us you can only fight for safety alone. You are line dancing to Garth Brooks and entertaining the güiro when you can. You are slowly caressing the crystal ball to predict your own culture in the process. 
         Chicanismo is an open wound. Charlie calls him “Sal.” And so I will, too. 
         To Sal — I see you. I see you, because my collection of written words is an attempt to capture what you do with your art. 
         

         Warmly,

         María