2014 Goals

One more day til the end of 2013. This year has been filled with hardships and heartbreaks. No matter what happened this year, my ultimate goal was to keep on a smile no matter what strikes blew at my face. At one point I lost my job overseas, and was hauling my belongings down a sidewalk to a friend's apartment a mile down the city road at eight in the morning. As it started pouring cold rain on me and my luggage, I ran for shelter under a wooden gazebo that stunk of urine, alcohol, and cigarette butts. It was a good hour of contemplating life, chain smoking and thinking. No money. No job. No home. Goals of returning home to Texas with a wad of cash, extra teaching and photography experience, and a good mental state of mind were demolished. And before tears began to tumble out of my eye sockets, I began to laugh out loud at the fact that I was mostly pissed off about sitting in an area that had no free wifi signal. I was more upset at first world problems?! That's when I realized, that it's OK. Everything will be OK. Being at the brink of a nervous breakdown was probably the best wake up call for me. It was time to edit my goals, turn my wifi-less phone off, and keep on moving. My grandfather once told me that movement is what keeps people alive. "All my friends are dead because all they did was sit on their ass all day! Me? I'm always moving! And I'm always living!" 

 It was almost instantaneously after my epiphany that the rain let up and the sun came out. I picked up my bags and left my little thinking gazebo for another lonely soul to use for a moment of contemplation. 

I feel as if I'm always dodging the negative bullets, especially at home surrounded by negative people who yell and cry all day and all night about senseless things. THINGS. There are selfish people surrounding me, and it's rare to see selfless and content people. It was during Christmas vacation when I looked around and saw that there aren't many out there. A few came to mind. A few aunts and uncles, my father, and a cousin. But the only one that struck as a human being capable of putting a smile on a face during the worst hours of life, the one who opened the door to anybody who needed a home or a smile, the one who's laughter could be heard from the other side of a crowd, was my mother. The mother to everybody, the mother of all mothers. I have been told by everybody that knew her that I was exactly like her, inside and out. On Christmas Eve, a friend of the family began to cry telling a story about my mother letting him have a home and treating him like a son as a teenager, when an aunt came up to him and slapped his back. "Don't do that!" She yelled. "We all know she is a replica of her mother and it hurts us all." Apparently it hurts everybody that looks into my eyes but it's taboo to get emotional about it. She was loved beyond loved. Because she was positive. And selfless. 

I dug into my own personality and decided that they were all wrong about me. I'm not as humble, caring, and devoted to others as she was. I've been too busy getting my own life together. But starting now, on December 30, 2013, I will be more like my mother. I will shape my personality to give everybody what I can emotionally. I will get the world around me to smile. I will show modesty and empathy. Rather than running away or shutting the door on negativity, I need to "kill it with kindness" as my father says. 

Ghandi said, "Be the change you want to see in the world." 

And, if all else fails and the world around me is still bouncing around in shallow, bragging bubbles of  negativity and nonsensicality, I can just tell everybody to go f#%@ themselves. 

Let 2014 begin.

Online Dating Failure, The Teenage Years

I've recently taken a chance with an online dating website in hopes to find the man of my dreams. Mister perfect. The gallant that will serenade at my window and take me away to some far away happy bubble land where we will live ever-after. And he will tell me how amazing and beautiful I am every single moment while bathing me in a thousand sunflowers and dark chocolate M&Ms a day...

...Or to at least to meet somebody that will be more compatible with me than the guy standing at the end of the bar, chugging his Budweiser and high-fiving his fellow douche-bag friends. Four months and multiple failed potentials later, I've realized that I just may have better luck with mister Budweiser hi-fiver. 

Although website dating is still fairly new to me, this isn't my first time using the good ol' WWW to date. In fact, I find it much too easy to date online now compared to my first online dating encounter when I was a freshman in high school, at age 15. Match.com was just sparking around the globe, and Matchmaker.com, the first online dating website, was bringing singles together since the 80s. I can't imagine how long it took to find a true match off of dial-up Prodigy in 1980 something, but I'm assuming it wasn't as efficient as now.

 Being a young teen and not ready to open an account and create a singles profile just yet, I stumbled onto a boy my age via a chatroom. Yes, a chatroom. A room where everybody and anybody can have a conversation until some adolescent thought it was funny to enter the room and hit the same buttons a thousand times. The only reason I know chatrooms exist today in 2013 is because my uncle still goes into them to cause chaos over topics such as sports, music, and politics. He'll scream about the people in the chatroom for an entire week, as if he lost an entire room full of friends.

My online dating experience was short-lived as a teen, but the effort was more than posting a few pictures, throwing on a profile summary, and wa-la, your inbox is full of possible dates. Mine took weeks of waiting, phone calling, and finally meeting a month later. James, my first online date encounter, decided to talk to me in a private chatroom, where we could discuss more serious things, such as music and...whatever it is that 15 year old teens discuss in private chat rooms. Had I copied and pasted the chat, it probably would've gone something like this:

James55: Hi ReneeDia! I'm hanging out with my friends. You seem cool!

ReneeDia: Hi! And hi, friends of James55! You seem cool, too! What are ya'll doing?

James55: Just watching some music videos on M2. We're gonna play N64 then walk around Walmart.

ReneeDia: That's cool! I'm listening to some music in my room. I'm so bored!

James55: Do you want to talk before we play videogames? What's your phone number?

This was before texting. Before LOL's and WTF's. Before people hesitated to pick up the phone and just talk. It feels awkward now to actually dial a number and call somebody. As if talking on the phone is taboo now that IMs and texts and Facebook chats have taken over our voices. Life, before smart phones and super easy access to the internet, was challenging and fun. Waiting for a phone call or a letter in the mail gave a sense of anticipation, of exhilaration, that rarely occurs in an instant response-or-bust-world. 

James calls.
We talk. And after a week of talking it was time to discuss future plans, such as when we'd be able to sneak a peak of what each other look like. This required some extra time. Was he worth it? Of course he was! He was my first online dating lover ever! Somebody I'd meet for an hour and wouldn't think about for the next fifteen years!

Sending pictures wasn't as easy as snapping a few photos, throwing some cheap filters in to block out insecurities, and sending it a few minutes later in hopes he likes what he sees. This required begging a friend to take various pictures of me hanging out around my house with a Walgreens-bought disposable camera. I sat on the floor, at my table, and on the bottom of my stairs.
I looked left. *snap!*
I looked down, smiling a cute smile. *snap!*
I wrapped my arms around my chest, looking in the distance in an unsure pose with a sweater on, a "My So-Called Life" impression. *snap!*
I finished off the 24 exposure roll with random shots of my dog, my mom, and my backyard and ran back to Walgreens only to wait until Monday for my pictures to process. Waiting done, I include my three best pictures and a page and a half letter with a seemingly nonchalant attitude, when in reality I rewrote that letter three times.

His letter comes in the mail.
It's the same length as mine of scribble, and inserted is a single 4x6 picture. Shirt off, long blonde hair down just above his shoulders, and there's a flash from the mirror's reflection that leaves me thinking...I think I see his face? I think he's hot! I'm in love! Mind you, about as in love as a teeny innocent teen can be. 

We meet.
Two weeks later we finally meet in Austin. He's from Shertz, Texas, and I'm on my way to Austin from San Antonio. My father drops me off at the mall...along with my younger brother and neighbor, both overprotective boys. My two bodyguards escort me to the entrance, where James is waiting for me. He's just like in the picture, except...his heavy acne has his face sagging off his skull, his long blonde hair's in knots and obviously hadn't been washed that week, and he's tall and lanky and awkward.
And I have an hour-long romantic stroll around the mall with this thing.

Had I actually enjoyed James's company, I would've minded my brother and neighbor peeking and sneering at every corner of the mall and every store entrance. But James was not my type, whatever my type was half a lifetime ago. We had nothing to talk about except the weather inside the mall. 

After my first online dating experience, I vowed to never date outside my visible surrounding area outside the web, until I became older and dating potentials became scarce. How funny it would be stumble upon James again on a real dating website. I should stalk his name and find out if we're compatible 15 years later. ;)

My Daily Demise

I kill myself each day. It’s only a small dosage, a minuscule of a milligram, of death. Every day is a different death from the previous. One day my slipper fails to reach the next step down the long, concrete staircase, and as I fall I smash the back of my head at the bottom of the stairs. Another day, I inadvertently walk in front of a car that’s going at a faster pace than my feet, and will sideswipe my body and crush my torso in the process. Other times it will be a slow death, where the same car hits me straight on, and as I fall down to the ground, I see the bottom car parts as it runs me over at 25 miles per hour.

I’ve been shot in the back of the head by an angry passenger on the subway. I’ve been bashed in the skull by a crazy lunatic on the side of the road with a bottle of wine. Ive been stabbed, I’ve been gutted. I’ve been tortured. I’ve been left in a ditch and buried alive. I’ve been yesterday’s murder victim as seen on the news. Each day is different. And each day is creatively, morbidly, and vividly deathly. 

My brain isn't always a bleak and dreary mess. I throw myself into these daily snippets of scenarios for a few moments. Although my death has yet to occur, my biggest fear in life is death itself, being my own or that of a loved one. I'm so afraid of death that I mentally put myself through it each day. I’ll sit there and imagine all aspects, facing my biggest fear in the deepest pit of my brain. Some nights they will be so real, I’ll fall asleep teary eyed. Some days they are so vivid, I need to shake myself and think of candy rainbows and happy giraffes. Although thinking of death may only prolong a grieving period that has yet to happen, I must face my fears.

Morbid? Just a tidbit. With a minute, a near zero percent chance of choosing my own death, it’s only natural to at least have a small list of ideal ways to die in my purse just in case the chance of choice arrives. These include:

1. While sleeping, having a magical dream, and dying right in the midst of dancing about in my dreamland, as if I were meant to be there forever.

2. Laughing myself to death, aka fatal hilarity. Wouldn't that be funny? Ha..Ha..

3. Fan death, which is just another way to die in my sleep, except while the fan is running in a closed room. This apparently only occurs in South Korea, so I’d have to travel back to South Korea in order to die, and in that case, I’d take one of the two previous options.

The absolute worst way to die? Being stung and paralyzed by a digger wasp, only to have digger wasp eggs nested inside my body, and later eaten from the inside out by baby digger wasps! Luckily, digger wasps only use other insects for egg laying, and not humans. Whew! 

The day will arrive when one of these hundreds of scenarios will, in fact, be a reality. I have no choice as to which one, therefore I would need to be mentally prepared for that one crucial moment which would inevitably be my last moment. 

I don't know whether my life would flash in front of my eyes before death – that’s a lot of life to flash around in only a few milliseconds. And seeing a bright light before death? Patrick Swayze in Ghost was utterly creepy under that said light, and it reminds me of florescent lights, which hurt my eyes anyways. But if any of these bright lights or memory flashes do occur, I’d like to be prepared for that as well. Meaning, I want to let the people that I love the most know that I love them. I want to answer every single call made, and say “I love you” a million times. I want to take out time from my life to see them. I want them to know absolute sure that I love them, even after a long hard fight. I will slam the door and yell “I’m pissed, but I still love the shit out of you!” So, as that flashing memory light thing turns on when I’m in the process of dying, I won't have to stop to stress about whether or not I told my loved ones that I love them. Which leads me to my list of possible random thoughts that may run through my dying brain…other than the fact that I'm dying.

1. I hope my brothers and dad will be okay. 

2. They better play “Spain” at my funeral.

3. Oh, and they'd better remember to do that one thing I told them to do with my ashes! I'm going to be so mad if they just bury me like a dead dog!

4. I hope my wishes come true and I’m reincarnated as a seagull living in Medellin, Colombia.

5. I hope my ex-boyfriend cries a lot, I mean A LOT, and realizes I was amazing and he should never have broken up with me. But who cares cause I'm pretty much dead now, right?

6. I really wanted a kid, dammit. Maybe by some off chance, there is a baby inside me and will become the miracle child, and will grow up to be the most amazing human being in all of existence.

7. I wish I could take my pillow with me to dead land.

8. Where is dead land? And why am I going there?! I don't want to die!

9. Fine. Just...just fine. I love you, life. I don't have a single regret. Hopefully death will treat me as kind as you did, life. Please take care of my loved ones. Goodbye.

10. I’m going to miss listening to The Beatles.

Maybe thinking so much about death is also my own creepy way to understanding this concept of mortality, something that everybody eventually goes through. Maybe I just want it to hurt a little at a time rather than ripping the band-aid off all at once. Maybe I should lay off my daily demise and focus on better and more progressive aspects of life, such as life itself. Maybe I should start this now. :)

Painting Austin

At the mention of Austin, music most likely comes to mind. I tell outsiders (those unfortunate ones who have never touched the Austin city borders) I'm from Austin, and I always get the same reply; "Oh, I hear Austin is so cool! There's a lot of music there, right?" This redundant remark on what my city is apparently about becomes annoying, but at least Austin's reputation is a pretty fantastic one. Music in Austin is thriving, from SXSW and Austin City Limits, to all corners of the city and all corners of the inner city streets, with multiple eccentric genres. Yet, this city has left quite a bit of room for other artistic expressions. Austin loves film. Austin loves writing. Austin loves bathing in hundreds of shades of paint. Across the city, creeping in alleys or spread across an entire block, there's walls and trains and buildings covered in art. It's a free outdoor art show. Walking around Austin is like walking straight into a massive mural.

Focus One Point And Breathe

The Union Pacific bridge runs high above Lady Bird Lake and lines the Austin skyline. This train bridge apparently was a perfect spot for a graffiti artist to paint away. It's one chunk of art that has snuggled itself into the Austin scene, and most likely won't be painted over without an Austinite dispute. Those lazily canoeing under the bridge will have a simple meditative cue as they pass: Focus one point and breathe.

Local To Global: Dream, Imagine, Create. HOPE

Right off South Lamar, there's a site nestled at Baylor Street and 11th that would give any graffiti artist an itch to make their mark. This landmark is an outdoor gallery project, Local To Global, founded by HOPE (Helping Other People Everywhere). The hill is steep and the layout is rigid; it looks like a building was ripped from the ground, leaving the bare foundation of cement walls and rusted steel rebar. Every corner of every cement wall is covered in paint, and the best graffiti artists in Austin came together to create a gallery for all of Austin to visit for free.

 i love you so much.

A simple phrase painted to express one's love to her partner turned out to be part of South Congress's icons. This graffiti on the side of Jo's Hot Coffee brings a smile to every passerby. The bright red words spread bright red love across South Congress, reaching every Austinite heart. In 2011, "i love you so much" was repainted due to an unfortunate night of vandalism, but still stands today.

The Austinites

In 2009 Shawn Gillespie, muralist from Louisiana, painted a depiction of what Austinites are truly all about. He was spot on! From the Austin-famous Leslie Cochran, to Save Barton Springs flyers, to film and music production, to naked local women reading Hippie Hollow brochures at a trendy cafe. Gillespie spent nearly two months painting the wall outside Hickory Street Bar and Grill on 8th and Congress, just down the road from the state capitol.

Keep Austin Green: Balcones Recycling

When driving down West Howard Lane, I tend to slow down each time while passing a line of stalled boxcars covered in graffiti. Spray-painting and tagging trains is nothing new; Graffiti on trains was a movement that began in New York as a way to advertise and spread rap, hip-hop, and graffiti artists beyond the boundaries of the Bronx. Balcones Recycling took that notion of train art by gathering Texan artists to create a burner (well-done graffiti covering an entire boxcar) on their trains, a way to get local artists painting while advertising their recycling company. Way to keep Austin green and local!

Murals On 6th

From each corner of San Jacinto and all the way down to North Lamar, murals on 6th street have recently been popping up at an intense rate, seemingly covering each crossroad and building. One of my favorite things to do while on break when working downtown is taking a long walk down 6th to catch a glimpse of the overwhelming display of art while observing the vibrant Austinites.

Renaissance On The Drag

Guadalupe Street, running alongside University of Texas, is best known as The Drag. Since the early 1970s, The Drag has gathered artists and street vendors, creating a local street market known today as the Austin Renaissance Market. It was also in the 1970s that murals popped up along the street, the most famous depicting Austin  icons and favorite geographic locations. Also on the drag are various pieces of art, including Bob Dylan and Louis Armstrong, from Federico Archuleta.

Seeking art in this ever-growing, ever developing city is easy, and each piece of outdoor art is a symbol of today's and yesterday's Austin. This city may be known for its music, but behind each musical note is a wall of paint created by and for the locals, capturing a thousand different colors and images of what Austin truly is. 

View Through A Glass Eye

His mother's shiny ball reflecting inside his eye is what saved his life. With every bounce of the ornament-like, majestic orb was a white shine and a quick glance inside his bright retina. Deep in his right eye, behind the cornea, through the pupil and lens, and snuggled within the jellied vitreous humor was a white ball of something that no parent wants inside their child's body. A tumor had grown and it was literally seen from outside in, behind this one year old's bright hazel eyes.

In 1992, Dylan was rushed from doctor to pediatric doctor around Austin to find the cause of the white reflection in his eye. Alas, MD Anderson Center in Houston found the culprit: retinoblastoma, a rare cancer found predominantly in children under the age of five.
With the help of cancer professionals at MD Anderson and the embracing support from Houston's Ronald McDonald House, Dylan was in good hands during his rough childhood term in the cancer battlefield.

Twenty years later, Dylan pulls out his custom-made artificial glass eye at any random moment: because he can.  His eye collection, a small box of fragile artificial eyes from childhood to adulthood, vary in shape, size, and color according to his current state of growth and change. They are a symbol of survival, and they've been a piece of his now cancer-free body for as long as he remembers. At one point, his mother carried them around in a pouch inside her purse as good luck until one day when she lost her purse. Luckily the purse was immediately returned that week. The reason? They couldn't understand why anybody would have a purse full of eyes! The bag must have been lucky after all.

Dylan hasn't a hint of hesitation when popping his eye out and tossing it into his new acquaintances' hands just to get a surprising jolt as they catch the glass shell, still warm from his body temperature. Growing up, he used it against his parents as a tactful threat to get his way. "If you don't let me play Lincoln Logs, I'll throw my eye away," he'd say. Well, that may have only worked once or twice before they took his Lincoln Logs and his eye away. At seventeen, Dylan even managed to escape serious DUI and underage drinking charges when a police officer pulled him over and asked, "Sir, why are your eyes red?" In which he promptly replied, "Officer, that's my fake eye. It always looks like that." The police officer apologized and headed back to his car shortly after.

Has Dylan always felt this secure with his missing eye? Of course not. Minor brief moments of uncertainty, curiosity, and timid apprehension came to light throughout childhood. Some moments, he'd spend hours in front of the mirror twisting, turning, and feeling the glass shell that looks like an exact replica of his right eye yet holds no visual function. Carefully crafted veins, contours, and pupil, an ocularist uses his creativity to professionally mix paints and silk threads to add a finishing touch. Placing his artificial eye into his socket is showing the world a beautiful piece of detachable body art. This glass eye, currently hidden under a black pirate patch for fashion fun, is amongst the many things that attracts people to him. If you take a closer look, you can actually stare through the glass and right into his positive soul.

In 2011 he decided to show the world, or those in his Facebook world, that he does, in fact, have an artificial eye. Cancer awareness is key, but taking comfort in talking to a cancer survivor with a fake eye was his intention. Taking pictures of his eye in hidden locations for his friends to find, a game of "Where's My Eye," sparked a whole new level of awareness and brought a wave of comments filled with curiosity. His comfort in raising this awareness derives from his loved ones, who's been there with him and for him. The constant affection and care from his family and friends reinforces his ability to overcome what some may label a disability. He tweaks this 'disability' by molding it into his life and personality, and shares it with the ones closest to him.

Dylan plans to update his "Where's My Eye" photo album. What new places will his friends find his eye next?  But beware, dear readers. If you upset this young man, you just might have a glass eyeball thrown at you!

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'Bouncing Into Graceland' (Or, A Trip to Memphis)

"The mississippi delta was shining like a national guitar. 

I am following the river, down the highway, 

through the cradle of the civil war. 

I'm going to Graceland" -Paul Simon

I spent ten hours on the road from Austin to Memphis to celebrate my 29th birthday. So, why didn't I just drive to Houston or Dallas? Why not visit Oklahoma City or New Orleans? Why didn't I fly to San Francisco or Seattle or New York City instead? Why, of all places in America, did I choose to go to Memphis for my birthday? I didn't visit for the history of rock-n-roll where Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash and Muddy Waters kicked off. Or because Elvis danced and sang around the stages and studios within the city. I didn't go to learn about the Civil War or to take pictures at the famous Memphis Cotton Exchange. No, not even to watch the local blues bands on Beale Street or to walk along Old Man Mississippi Delta. Although these tourist spots were a plus in my adventure, I didn't visit Memphis, Tennessee, because of Memphis, Tennessee. I took that road trip because I have a strange and semi-disturbing infatuation for Paul Simon.

Paul Simon's Graceland was stuck inside my head and my heart for multiple months prior to my birthday. I was suckered into his inadvertent subliminal advertising; did Memphis pay Paul to boost city tourism?   While the simple movie line, "I am NOT drinking any f*@king Merlot," from Sideways brought the sales of Merlot down in America a huge notch, I'm sure Paul Simon's song brought a whole swarm of people into the gates of Graceland. Or was I the only product placement sucker?

I went on a magical journey "to be received," and although my "traveling companion" was not nine years old, we both acted so. The journey to Memphis consisted of a copious amount of Paul Simon music. And once there, we watched live local bands playing anything but Paul. Between food, music, drinking, museums and site seeing, we had a busy three day journey. 

BEALE STREET
Of course, as any typical Memphis tourist, my first stop was Beale Street. Just as Los Angeles has its Hollywood Boulevard, Austin has its Sixth Street, and New Orleans has its Bourbon Street, Beale Street is a tourist party and music strip where locals set the stage for a night of fun. Similar to Hollywood Boulevard's "Walk of Fame" Beale Street's sidewalks are dotted with brass musical notes (rather than stars) engraved with names of famous blues musicians. It feels like a tourist trap on the outside while walking along the newly paved, pedestrian-only strip with hosts and bouncers standing outside and bribing you in with specials galore, but it's a different story on the inside of each bar. Music has been the heartbeat of Beale Street since the 1860s and still holds true to its official name, "Home of The Blues". The local musicians pump out a tangible amount of energy and soul into each song, even on weekday nights when the crowd is minimal. The only downfall? Tourist spots mean tourist prices. Note to self: Ordering a Guinness with a side of Jager Bomb is good on the belly, but bad on the wallet. Also, the Beale Street late night flippers are amazing, so a dollar or two will make them smile. :)

PEABODY HOTEL
As a child, my family and I were shameless in spending our vacation days swimming at a fancy hotel while drinking Shirley Temples, and sneaking back to our not-so-fancy motel down the street by sundown. It was fun then, and surprisingly it's still fun as an adult, especially at the oh-so-fancy shmancy Peabody Hotel, another historic tourist hotspot and home of the Peabody ducks.















I learned more about the world-renowned Peabody mallard ducks than anything else on this trip. Each morning they head down from their duck penthouse suite to the first floor of the Peabody Hotel. There, they walk along a red carpet and hop into a fountain, where they flap and quack until 4pm, and they march back upstairs for dinner and probably a duck movie before bedtime. This daily Duck March, led by a Duck Master, has been an ongoing tradition since 1932. It began when the then general manager and his friend drunkenly returned from a hunting trip and placed some ducks in the hotel fountain as decoy, a silly prank. Jack Daniels seems to bring out some great ideas! Unfortunately all Jack ever brought out of me was my dinner...

Sipping on coffee and duck-watching by a cozy fireplace in the lobby, listening to a romantic piano serenade, or wandering the elegant hallways of the Peabody Hotel is definitely a must in Memphis, even if you're not a hotel guest. ^.~

MISSISSIPPI DELTA
My favorite hobby is walking. I can outwalk anybody for hours either in $2.50 Old Navy sandals in the  middle of a Texas summer or wrapped in a jacket in winter. It was soul-cracking cold outside in December, but I wandered around downtown Memphis and along the Mississippi Delta. Parks are stretched out along the river, where history is literally written on plaques, and steamboats scatter the riverfront.

DOWNTOWN
To get a true feel of downtown and do as the local Memphians do without a tourist ticket price, I hopped on the trolley, the local public transportation, heading down Main Street. Watching the city slowly pass through the window inside the vintage trolley, I got the feeling that this city hadn't changed too drastically over the past decades, possibly century. A few high rises are plotted around the city, but you get the sense of traveling back in time. Brick buildings with new business signs are slapped over chipped and faded store signs, once painted bright and colorful. On a typical weekday in most cities, downtown is a bustling center for business workers and shop owners alike; not Memphis. The only challenge of finding a parking spot in the center of the city was finding an unbroken parking meter. I absolutely loved the beautiful and old feel of the city. I enjoyed the simple pleasures of not having the need to rush, local restaurants serving intensely delectable southern food, and having the comfort of southern hospitality everywhere I went. Memphis was filled with hidden treasures, and all that was needed to find them was a little bit of walking. Of course, driving around isn't so bad either.


MEMPHIS MUSIC TOURS

Think of singing into the very microphone that Elvis and other famous musicians of his time breathed into. Consider watching the making, the very inception of what glorious guitar solos eventually become, starting at the factory. Get a historical grasp of the foundation of what music has become before walking the streets of Memphis. Leaving Memphis without visiting the Gibson factory, the Rock 'n' Soul Museum, Sun Studios, or Graceland is leaving with an empty understanding of Memphis. 

MEMPHIS ZOO

I was never a fan of visiting a city, spending an afternoon at the zoo, as the only culture I get is animal culture. But sometimes the zoo is a caged representation of local culture, and it's a way to escape the city life and hop into animal life. Since it was winter, the kiddie ride park was closed and the giraffes (my favorite animal in the entire world) were nowhere to be found, but they had a tent with an ice-skating rink, blaring 1980s music that was probably hidden from the general public for a reason but the locals seemed to love it. Also, I could sit at the base of the aquarium and stare at the same sea lion circle around for hours. My favorite were the fat pandas sitting on their fat bottoms and eating bamboo. A plus in the Chinese pavilion, across the panda cage, was watching a young man propose to his girlfriend, something I've never seen outside of television. The Memphis Zoo, a local romance scene! 

GRACELAND
We all know those annoying people who sit in the parking lot after a concert and blare the music of the the group they just saw ten minutes prior. Well, we were those people. While leaving the gates of Graceland we threw on an Elvis mix on Pandora. Only, we never actually entered Graceland; I opted out last minute to keep the mystery of Graceland's magic within Paul Simon's song. 

The Brew: 3 Decades of Musical Craft

Music and beer. Two things that go hand in hand. And if you ever wonder why the earth rotates in such a floaty and dance-like motion, it has nothing to do with momentum or velocity; it has everything to do with music. And beer. It was a drunken afternoon when four young Rodriguez brothers sat in their garage in Brownsville, Texas, and decided those two should stay together, forever. Or at least until the world wants them to part; nobody's spoken up at that notion for over thirty years.


Rudy, Michael, Mark and Joe, the Rodriguez brothers and not-so-beer-savvy brewers, were inebriated, hot and bored in the garage of theirs, staring blank and drunkenly at the flies sucking on what's left of their homemade brew. Nobody seemed to take notice of those little, buzzy flies zigzagging about in the room. 


Suddenly, a tiny, microscopic nerve exploded in Rudy's brain. It was a quick burst of light that ran through his veins and peered out of his retina. At that very moment, with a slap of the knee and a snap at the fingers Rudy stood up, grabbed a dusty Gibson guitar sitting beside him, and began to play. His melodic rhythm made Joe smile, and he nodded his head to the beat and pulled out a harmonica from the back pocket of his sweaty jeans. Michael ran out of the garage and quickly slid back in with a guitar in one hand and a bass in the other. He threw the bass into the air while Mark, in slow motion, simultaneously jumped to catch it. His long, tangled hair wrapped around his face and into the air. Rudy, smiling and closing his eyes, sang into the microphone that also happened to come from Joe's back pocket. They jammed out to "Walking The Dog", which probably would've been the biggest cover hit of their time. Unfortunately Rolling Stones already had that covered. Damn you, Stones! After a magical few hours of jamming out, they decided to brew another batch of beer and name their band after the alcoholic substance that brought them together; Homebrew. Years later, they would change that name. The Rodriguez brothers weren't just a home garage band at that point. They were the real deal. They were, and still are, The Brew.



This amazing story is how I, the bassist's daughter, the retired part-time tambourine player at nine years old, and the Brew child, envisioned the beginning of The Brew. Although they had a similar start,  I'm sure they didn't begin with such dramatic gusto. Or did they?

Within three decades and four albums, The Brew has morphed into a well respected and professional band.  Covering classic country music from Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings and Commander Cody to rock music from Rolling Stones, The Doors and Steve Miller Band, Homebrew started out by jamming at parties around Brownsville. Thus, it was time to move out of the stagnant Valle and into the beating heart of Texas, and the heart of music. Young bassist, Mark Rodriguez, made the biggest move of his life in 1978 when he hitchhiked to Houston and met up with his brothers to be part of the blues and jazz nightclub scene. But hollow Houston was no place for a deserving and upcoming jazz band. They kicked off the 1980s decade by popping into Austin, flagging it home to The Brew and molding themselves into Austin's "Live Music Capital of the World" scene. Unfortunately, due to a tragic and sudden incident, Rudy Rodriguez never saw the up and coming band reach its peak. The brothers dedicated their first album, In The Beginning, to their late brother, The Brew's founder and inspiration.


Throughout the 80s and much of the 90s The Brew played their own originals while jamming to jazz fusion, R&B and funk. Cover songs from Anita Baker, Sade, Steely Dan, George Benson, Jay Guiles, and The Crusaders were heard from clubs up and down Austin's famous 6th Street by The Brew. They were immersed in the Austin local music scene, playing events at Auditorium Shores and Blues On The Green and at venues such as Top Of The Marc, Wylies, Jazz On 6th, and Elephan Room.
They've shared their passion for music by touring around Texas, popping around multiple states, and flying out to Cancun, Mexico. The Brew has always given fellow musicians an open invitation to sit in on songs and sets. Those who have come to watch and jam out with the band include local musicians, friends, and well known musicians such as Boz Scaggs, Stanley Jordan, Spyro Gyra and Gypsy King members, and Kirk Whalum.

In 1996 the band took on a different tune and tweaked their style. It was the year Michael Rodriguez picked up the Spanish guitar, and he hasn't set it down since. They moved out of 6th Street and into the Warehouse District, where the older crowd watched them play at Cedar Street, Miguel's La Bodega (currently named Maria Maria's), and Sullivan's. Devoted, adamant fans dance to The Brew's Latin styles of flamenco jazz, salsa, merengue, and cha-cha.

Today, The Brew is still playing in Austin and jamming around Texas. They pack bars to their full capacity, set the scene for a floor filled with twirling dancers, and awe their fans over and over again by Michael's guitar solos. Some venues to catch The Brew at include Oasis (every summer Sunday since 1998), Maria Maria's (Warehouse District), Gloria's (The Domain), Z-Tejas (6th St.),  Elephant Room, San Antonio Jazz Fests, Sullivans (Houston, Texas) and Cobbleheads (Brownsville, Texas). The Rodriguez brothers don't plan on retiring from the band any time soon, and are brewing up their fifth album. Maybe I can pick up the tambourine after all these years and contribute to a song or two. If I'm still embarrassingly off beat, as I was as a child, I'll just sit in the audience and watch my dad and uncles play, something I've mastered since childhood. ^^

Information on The Brew can be found on their website: http://www.brewmusic.com