Anthony Martinez and Stella Medina

[00:01] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: My name is Anthony Martinez. I am 49 years old. Today's date is January 8, 2023. We are in El Paso, Texas. The name of my interview partner is Stella Medina, and she is my mother.

[00:15] STELLA MEDINA: Hello. I am Stella Medina, and I'm 72 years old. Today's date is January 8, 2023. I'm in El Paso, Texas, with my interview partner, E. Anthony Martinez, and he is my son.

[00:34] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Hey, mom.

[00:35] STELLA MEDINA: Hi. How are you doing?

[00:37] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Okay. How are you?

[00:38] STELLA MEDINA: So good to be here at Lafay.

[00:41] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Clinic in Segundo barrio.

[00:43] STELLA MEDINA: Right, in Segundo barrio. I mean, this was. These were my roots. Yeah. I was born in 1950, and from the time I was born till about the age of, I want to say, eight, I lived at 718 South Hill street. It's a few blocks from here, where I used to go to Jalisco Cafe and order snow cones and menudo. And I would visit buoy bakery for the most delicious sweet bread.

[01:19] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Yeah.

[01:20] STELLA MEDINA: Mm hmm. And so.

[01:24] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Okay, so go back to where. So where were you born? When were you born?

[01:28] STELLA MEDINA: I was born in El Paso, Texas, in 1950.

[01:32] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Which clinic were you born at?

[01:34] STELLA MEDINA: And I was born at Newark. It no longer exists.

[01:37] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: It was a Methodist clinic, right?

[01:39] STELLA MEDINA: Well, yes. And I also attended Houchen which was a daycare run by german nuns.

[01:46] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: And the home that you. That was 17. Eight South Hill street, right?

[01:51] STELLA MEDINA: Yes.

[01:51] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Tell me about that place. How did it come to be the family residence? Who built it? I think there's a story behind that, right?

[02:02] STELLA MEDINA: Yes. It was told to me that it used to be a horse corral. And it was true, because I'd be playing in the dirt, and lo and behold, I'd come across a horseshoe or two or three, but we lived there. It was a residence. It was a complete square. And the rooms that were built were built to follow that square shape. And it was built by my uncle Ralph with money that he would send my grandmother Lupe. While he was serving military, he was in the army. And so when he left the army, he completed his tour. He came and helped with whatever needed to be done structurally, and it became several families homes.

[03:00] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: I thought it was built by Grandpa Jose, your grandfather.

[03:02] STELLA MEDINA: Well, actually, you're right. It was Grandpa Jose. And he later got help from Uncle Ralph.

[03:09] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Grandpa Jose came from Mexico, right?

[03:11] STELLA MEDINA: And Grandpa Jose was my mother's father, and.

[03:19] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: And he came during the mexican revolution.

[03:21] STELLA MEDINA: And he was fleeing, like many families in the mexican revolution.

[03:27] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Similar to what we're seeing right now, right?

[03:29] STELLA MEDINA: Refugees? Very similar, yes.

[03:32] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: So when he arrived here, what did he do? You remember do you know how he made a life here and ended up building those horse stables into a family home?

[03:43] STELLA MEDINA: It was a challenge for him and my grandmother. It was a challenge in that they were very successful where they were from in Mexico. He had been some sort of a police officer there. And when they came to, when they fled the revolution and came to El Paso specifically, he had to really hustle and find ways to earn a living. So one of the things I remember distinctly, when I was about six years old, I'd be standing outdoors while my grandfather was mixing what was required to make adobes, the adobe bricks. Adobe bricks. And, I mean, they were tremendously heavy, but he would take several hours stirring and stirring under the hot sun, sweat running down his eyebrows. I mean, it was very hard, very hard, hard work anyway. But he. He filled these frames, these wooden frames. He filled them, and he gave them time to set. And when he had several stacks and stacks and stacks, little at a time, he would put these into his wheelbarrow, and he would laboriously walk and walk and walk blocks. I remember standing outside of where he was going toward, and he was looking for a construction site so he could sell these adobes. And one thing, as young as I was, I remember, you know, in order to have what you need in life, material wise and personally, you need to work hard. But I've got to do this differently.

[05:44] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: When he would work construction sometimes, or often he'd go north of the railroad tracks.

[05:48] STELLA MEDINA: Yes, he would. And he was not kindly reminded to return where he belonged. They had boundaries for people of mexican american backgrounds, and he would very sadly, you know, return. But that didn't stop him from continuing his work. This very same grandfather, oh, my gosh, was a painter. He loved to paint murals with oils. In fact, I have two hanging on my wall in my son's house right now. And this same man would walk to downtown La Placita and pick up little bags of candy, little orange slices. I don't know if you remember those. And what was it, the corn, orange and yellow corn type candies. Anyway, there was a variety that he would come, and there were several of us waiting for him. My aunt's kids were there. She lived there for a while. And, of course, us. We were four siblings, and there were two of us that would always mostly play outside. But I remember my grandfather being so generous in that way, and it made him so happy to share with his grandchildren.

[07:21] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: I remember you telling me that the grandpa Jose would sell the obese and also do construction north of the tracks. And when the sun went down, they would. I don't know who they were. Whether the police or people who live there would remind him that he needs to go back to Segundo Barrio, to South El Paso when the sun went down. And later on, I learned that that's called a sundown town. And there are many of those in the United States, often in the south, especially in black white communities. And so a sundown town means that when the sun goes down, you need to go back to your part of town. And I think a lot of people have forgotten or don't know that El Paso, for Mexicans, was also a sundown town. And I learned that from you when you told me that story about Grandpa Jose.

[08:12] STELLA MEDINA: That's correct.

[08:16] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: I know you have a story talking about some of the racism that Mexicans experienced in El Paso, which can be easy to forget today because I think we're about 80% Hispanic. Hispanic. Being culturally mexican or Mexican American is almost taken for granted. But when you were growing up, do you remember you were trying to ask for a piece of paper? How old were you? Where were you in school? Can you tell us that story?

[08:44] STELLA MEDINA: I want to also tell some stories before that time, but this particular one you reminded me about. I was in 7th grade. My english teacher was Miss Mullings. And I raised my hand to ask for a sheet of paper. And she looked at me and she turned red, and she looked at me and said, and of course, the class just broke out in laughter. And she goes, a what? And I had no idea. I didn't realize why she was asking me. Shed of paper. And she says, ma'am, I need for you to stand up right now and tell me why you are making mockery of that word. I said, I had no idea. I said, well, I'm not. You know, I need a piece of paper. You know, like the ones you're handing out. I didn't get one. And so she asked me to wait for her after school, and she told me, I need for you to learn how to say that word correctly. Now, repeat after me, sheet of paper, sheet, sheet of paper. And I stood there and, oh, I wanted to cry. I said, sheet of paper. Sheet of paper. It's kind of funny, but not right. And so when I got home, I made it a point to lock myself in the bathroom and to say the word I did. I was intelligent enough to figure out somewhere in the middle of that word, there's sounds that don't exist in Spanish. But let's see, it's got to be e. E. As opposed to. And then in Spanish, the e is an e sound, actually. But I figured it out. I said e e. But I'll tell you what, I didn't say that word for another year. There's no way I was going to have him make fun of me because of my natural pronunciation in my own language.

[11:01] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: That really had an impact on you, didn't it?

[11:03] STELLA MEDINA: Oh, it did. It did.

[11:05] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: I remember you telling me, because you raised Mark, my brother and I, mostly monolingual English, and I don't remember you going out of your way not to teach us Spanish or expose us to Spanish because we heard it with other family members. And even when you and dad didn't want us to understand what you were saying, you would switch to Spanish. And it worked because we often didn't understand. But I remember you telling me that you really wanted us to speak English really well, in part because he didn't want us to go through that. That kind of discrimination that you experienced or to suffer.

[11:43] STELLA MEDINA: Correct. Correct. And I call that. I created a term to help me understand the world, and I call it race fog. Race fog, to me, are people that see other people in tunnel vision through one lens and not have the ability to understand where that person is coming from and how important their culture, their language, and their foods and everything that comes with it is. So, you know, I don't fault the people that look through us at us with. With single lenses, but it definitely is a race fog. And I came across race fog again when I was going through high school, getting ready to graduate, and I went to go see my counselor, Miss Gramley, and I was so excited with the prospect of graduating from high school and going further, but she took out my transcript and looked at it.

[12:56] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: And this is at El Paso High.

[12:57] STELLA MEDINA: At El Paso High. El Paso, Texas, yes. Here at central Texas Central. El Paso central. El paso. Mm hmm. And she pulled out my transcript and said, I am so sorry. She said, but you don't look like you would. This doesn't look to me. Your performance doesn't look to me like you can do college work.

[13:22] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Were you making bad grades or were you having trouble?

[13:25] STELLA MEDINA: I was having. Okay. It was. I had the ability to make a's and b's, which I later found out I performed very well. But at that point, at that moment and then on the transcripts, honestly, I mean, if you looked at them, I was making b's, mostly c's. But what she never asked me, and I didn't offer to tell her, is that I had a very traumatic childhood growing up and the thought of homework time, schoolwork time, that was non existent. Even though my parents did stress the importance of education, the lifestyle, family lifestyle was such that there was no peace, quiet, there was no space for me to work as it was for my three siblings. I mean.

[14:19] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: And so you're very poor, too, right?

[14:24] STELLA MEDINA: We went without a lot. We never tasted whole milk until I got married.

[14:30] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: It was just powdered milk.

[14:31] STELLA MEDINA: Powdered milk or pet's milk, cat milk that we kept in the refrigerator. And so, yeah, it was very, very difficult for us to do any kind of academic work under those conditions. Plus, we were expected as girls. We were three girls and one boy. We were expected to go straight home after school and prepare dinner to the extent possible. My mother would put the finishing touches after she got in from work. My mother's mother was a working woman. My mother was a working woman. And she came in, she fed us, she cleaned up, and she would sit at her sewing machine and make us the most beautiful little dresses, the best she could.

[15:22] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: She is a seamstress, right, at man manufacturing and other. Farah, I think at one point, yes.

[15:28] STELLA MEDINA: Farah, she knew Willie Farah, the owner. Yes. She was very hardworking. So that's another experience about me, not me wanting to do things differently in life.

[15:42] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: So you're meeting with the school counselor, El Paso. Hi.

[15:45] STELLA MEDINA: Thank you for bringing me back. Yes. So I'm meeting with her, and she's saying, so I don't think your college material. I will recommend, Miss Medina, that you consider Durham business college, which isn't too far from here, referring to El Paso Central. El Paso. And there you can take shorthand. You can take typewriting. You can, you know, take basic accounting, you know, maybe work as a secretary. There would be, you know, two languages. There would be a job available for you anytime. But I would say, save yourself money and efforts and labor, going to college. Don't waste your time. Of course, I was very disappointed in hearing that. I took my books and I said, thank you, and I walked out. And when I got home, when my mother arrived from work, she said, why are you so down? What's going on? Why are you so sad? And so I told her, and she said, stella, stella, who knows your abilities better than you? And I thought about it. I said, no, I don't think anybody. She says, then go do what you know you can do.

[17:19] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: What did you do?

[17:21] STELLA MEDINA: And so, not knowing where to even begin, because all the information that had to do with college would go to only certain students never to me.

[17:33] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Which students were those in your time?

[17:35] STELLA MEDINA: They were english monolingual speakers mostly, and mostly white students, mostly blonde, blue eyed, or whatever color hair. But white students. Students.

[17:46] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: It's fair to say that Mexican Americans and Mexicans in that time were tracked to technical and non professional jobs, right?

[17:55] STELLA MEDINA: They were the gatekeepers for a generation or more. Yes. Yes. And so anyway, I did. I went on to go to University of Texas at El Paso. And I'm thankful to say that I had many wonderful opportunities from professors that believed in my abilities. And I made straight A's and B's, my bachelor's, and I received my bachelor's in education. And then I was handpicked from 25 students. Twelve were picked to work on their masters, and I was one of them, and I made straight a's.

[18:36] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: So would you go back, if you could go back to yourself at that age, would you tell yourself something or would you tell us, the high school counselor, what would you tell either one of you if you could go back and tell them how things turned out?

[18:52] STELLA MEDINA: I will tell you first, before I answer that question, I'm trying to do this chronologically. I came across a lot of, several incidences of race fog. Another one was, I was asked to attend a Southern Baptist convention. It was a meeting, a conference. And when we got there, we were six of us, five whites, and I was the only non white. And we got off the, out of the van, and we went into this well, before walking into the restaurant. We're in Wayland College. That's up there, right? Somewhere near Lubbock or what have you. Anyway, on the door it said, no Mexicans or dogs allowed. And I said, oh, that's funny. I mean, they're trying to be funny, but that's not funny. But okay, well, what the heck? We walked in, we sat down. It was a fast food place. I mean, nothing fancy. And five people were served water, including the pastor, who was also hispanic, Jose Rosales. Jose Luis Rosales. And. And then, of course, it took forever to bring a menu to order, and everybody got a menu except me. And I thought, okay, well, this is very interesting. And then they ordered, and Hermano Rosales brother, Rosales said, we need another menu for this young lady. And they said, yes, okay. Of course, they walked away and people started getting their food, and I still had no menu. Anyway, Ronald Rosales just said, you know what? This is not the place for us to eat. And he signaled to the waiter and said, either we all get served or none of us. And since you have certain policies or rules or whatever, we're going to excuse ourselves. And we did. So that was another experience that left me thinking, whoo.

[21:14] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: How old were you at that time?

[21:15] STELLA MEDINA: I was 16 years old.

[21:17] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Okay.

[21:18] STELLA MEDINA: Mm hmm. Actually, I was 15 because I was very near being 16 years old as a senior, graduating senior. So anyway, but your question took me there, and then you asked me for another.

[21:37] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Well, you went on to get your bachelor's.

[21:39] STELLA MEDINA: My bachelor's.

[21:40] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: And then you got selected to be to your masters and.

[21:43] STELLA MEDINA: Oh, okay. Thank you. And then I applied after I taught a few years here in El Paso, like four or five years, not very long. And then I said, you know, I think I'd like to work outside of my little circle that I've known all my life, and I think I want to apply for a position at the Texas education Agency in Austin, Texas. And so I did. I applied and I was called and I was asked to go interview. And so it was a very long interview. I arrived at ten in the morning, and I was still there at 330 in the afternoon, which, by the way, I reminded Doctor Cruz, who was hiring me. Can I have a glass of juice or something? Haven't had anything since this morning. So he apologized, of course. But anyway, I went through another experience of that race fog in that I became friends with Sarah Stanley Todd, who became my friend there in that department of research and evaluation. And she said, do you know that when we were closing your interview, Doctor Cruz said, you know what? I think we need to hire her. She is. She's white enough to be the governor's wife. Let's hire her. Sarah said, her jaw almost dropped to the ground.

[23:24] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: But you got the job, right?

[23:25] STELLA MEDINA: Right. But I got the job, you know.

[23:28] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: And this is the Texas Education Agency, so this is the education agency that oversees all the educational programs for the state based in Austin, Texas.

[23:38] STELLA MEDINA: And I was hired to help develop the first spanish version criterion reference test, which was non existent everywhere.

[23:48] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: The standardized test that every student took.

[23:51] STELLA MEDINA: Appropriate grade level, that the one in place is called the Star, and it's still, of course, ongoing. And I was so thrilled to be a part of that because of my bilingualism. And thanks to mom and dad, in their insistence that I be bilingual, they said I would be more marketable. And boy, were they right.

[24:15] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: I remember you telling me you travel a lot, and I think after you worked on the standardized test, the spanish version, I don't know if it was the same department or, or if it was a different department, but you would travel around the state auditing right. Auditing different school districts, meeting with superintendents, meeting with teachers to monitor their compliance with state law. I don't even know if Texas does that anymore, but they've gone to a different model. But back then, they'd actually take the time to go help school districts remain in compliance and with state law, in part, requirements related to bilingual education. Right. And that's what you did. And so I remember you telling me stories about you going to different parts of Texas, maybe East Texas or the panhandle or even parts of south Texas that were different from El Paso. Right. El Paso. It's culturally, we're right next to Mexico. It's even in your day growing up. Right. It wasn't necessarily accepted to be mexican or mexican american, but I think that that's changed within your lifetime. Right.

[25:26] STELLA MEDINA: It has changed. I think many of us who experienced race fog learned to not overcome, but to help make the world a better place by promoting the importance of multilingualism, multiculturalism.

[25:46] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: I'm just curious. I'd never heard you use this word race fog before this term, but it sounds like, to me, like you're talking about racism. Is it hard for you to say racism instead of, is that why race flog is easier to say?

[26:02] STELLA MEDINA: Well, it's my own term I created. And it's not that it's easier. It's that I don't think people mean to be ignorant for the sake of ignorance. I think they just. Their lenses are blurred. Okay. And they only see through a tunnel vision. They see people and they make preconceptions about who they should be, how they should talk, how they should. And if they don't fit that box, then something is not right. Okay? Then the person needs to fix himself to become more of what they perceive a successful person and from what race. I mean, they don't mean to be. That's how they were brought up. The conversation.

[27:04] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: The fog.

[27:04] STELLA MEDINA: The conversation, yeah. Fog was created by conversations around that table at some point with family members, out during dinner or whatever.

[27:13] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: That's how you raised me, to see racism that way. And I think it's helped me a lot. I was just curious because, you know, racism is racism. But that rings for me, what you're saying. I appreciate that. So take me to. You're in your.

[27:34] STELLA MEDINA: Yes, I'd like to add one more incident that exemplifies race fog. Would you know, wouldn't you know that as. Yes. After I. We had a spanish version in place. 1984 had never existed before. I would call California, Florida, Washington, just, you know, what are you doing in the way of testing the abilities of reading, writing, math in Spanish? They said, we are looking at Texas. You know, we don't have anything yet. So I was very happy about that, to be a part of that, be a pioneer of that. But then they asked me if I would move into the compliance area, accreditation and evaluation, and yes, they hop on a plane and go here, go there, East Texas, West Texas, central, south, everywhere. And they asked me to go to Austin, Texas, to one of the schools there, and I won't say which one, but I'm given a list of all those teachers and persons, actually administrators, that they wanted me to interview. And I walk into this particular teacher's no counselors office, and I see who, of all people and teachers, Miss Mullings, the 7th grade teacher that asked me to stand up in front of class and correctly pronounce sheet of paper. I was very happy for the opportunity. And when I finished my two, three questions that I needed to ask her to ascertain their level of academic achievement, I said, I don't know if you remember me, Miss Mullings, 7th grade, Lamar? Oh, she turned purple, orange, and different shades of pink, and she goes, oh, you know, I vaguely remember that. And so, and so I said, you know, I just want you to know that you made me feel so inferior and you made me feel so badly about myself, but I want you to know that I overcame all of that. Obviously, I'm here with you. And I did mention you, and I mentioned Mark. You know, Anthony's attending law school, and Mark is Baylor, so she's like, I am so sorry. I am so sorry. I didn't mean to make you feel that way. But anyway, I thought that was another opportunity to educate somebody that otherwise would not.

[30:53] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: You weren't angry at her?

[30:54] STELLA MEDINA: No, I wasn't angry.

[30:56] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Say anything more than that?

[30:58] STELLA MEDINA: Yeah, no, that was it. Yeah. But I have made full circle. I feel like I've made. First, you look at this child who couldn't even drink milk, whole milk, because they couldn't afford it. You look at a child who attended St. Ignatius Catholic school near here up until they could no longer afford it. My parents could no longer afford it. I went from there to California for a while and then back to middle school and high school in El Paso. We lived a block from El Paso High school in El Paso, Texas, considered middle to lower middle. But mother bought us a house with her own two hands. At $7 a month. That was a lot of money, but it took her forever. And with the money that we made on that house at river street, we were able to move to another area, and we were at east El Paso, Texas. We bought our house on Fred Marty. Eleven, 401 Fred Marty. And from there, we moved to west, and we bought a house there on Pino Real, 6100, Pino Real, El Paso, Texas. And then most recently, I was in Austin 37 years. All this time, I left with. I left with my mom and dad's blessing, but I had no one, really, to a support system, no family there, no close friends, nothing. But after 37 years, I've had the opportunity to rent my house there around rock, Texas, and come and live with my son and his family and his wife. And he's bought a beautiful home. Country club foothills, 508 satellite drive, El Paso, Texas.

[33:18] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: So you feel like you're a success, right?

[33:20] STELLA MEDINA: And so I've made full circle.

[33:21] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: You're doing good.

[33:22] STELLA MEDINA: Yes.

[33:22] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: You're doing okay.

[33:23] STELLA MEDINA: Yes.

[33:24] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: All right. One thing you taught me really quick about race. I remember the first time I was bullied, it actually was from other mexican american and white kids, because they thought I was asian, so they'd call me Chino Japones. I think I was like, in maybe, I don't know, second grade or maybe third grade. Chino Japones. Chino Japones Because that's what they. Because I had asian looking eyes, and I remember coming home and crying to you, and then you said, well, if they think you're chinese Japanese, tell them you are. And I thought that was just so unhelpful. I was very frustrated. But I remember shortly thereafter what you're learning from other kids and what they say, the word anglo. So I came back and I was just like, what's this word anglo? What does it mean? And you said, don't worry about it. Don't worry about it. It doesn't mean. It doesn't mean anything. It's not an important distinction. And that's kind of how I grew up. I grew up really nothing looking. Race just was not a factor in my life. And I think part of it was helped by the way that you saw people, because you saw people as people, first and foremost. And our differences had to do more with, like you said, with fog, with perspective, with the way that you grow up, your language, the food that you eat. But it doesn't have. Because we're all one race, and that's what I've learned through my own education. We're all homo sapien. Sapien. That's the scientific term, but we're all the same. We're all the same people. And the differences that make us different are really only skin. They're more in our minds and in our hearts than what. So we have a lot more in common. Right. Than what makes us different.

[35:24] STELLA MEDINA: I'm glad that you were able to see it that way.

[35:27] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Yeah. So. And I think that's one of the things that came from your experiences, because that's what you passed on to me.

[35:34] STELLA MEDINA: And I'd like to close with a quote that my mother used to share with us. And it's. I'm paraphrasing. All right. Okay. I can paraphrase. And it comes from Jacob Isaac from his novel called Maria. It's a love story. It's a romance story. It's page 199, but it's with my mother's interpretation. She said, anytime you're faced with a situation, give it time. Al tiempo ay, que darle tiempo y el tiempo, el tiempo noza y el mismo tiempo, el tiempo nose engagnara. So don't react when you're faced with a situation. Pause, process, and then respond. Thank you very much for the opportunity to share our story here at Lafay clinic.

[36:35] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: So recently you were diagnosed with Parkinson's, right?

[36:38] STELLA MEDINA: Three days ago.

[36:39] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: Yeah. How are you?

[36:41] STELLA MEDINA: I'm super. I'm going to work with it, and I'm going to be a successful and confident 72 year old woman that will not give up.

[36:55] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: One of the questions that they. That was on the list was, how do you want to be remembered? And I think that's kind of don't want to ask it because it seems like you don't want to ask. You don't want to imply that there'll be a time when that being remembered is a thing.

[37:11] STELLA MEDINA: How would you, and I think I said it.

[37:16] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: How would you want to be remembered?

[37:17] STELLA MEDINA: I want to be remembered as being a kind and tolerant, bilingual, bicultural professional educator who wants to make the world a better place in every respect, including seeing the world from broader lenses than the monovisual, tunnel vision, one lens outlook on what a person can be. And really, I just want to be remembered for being kind and tolerant.

[38:08] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: You will? Yeah. All right.

[38:13] STELLA MEDINA: And I thank you, my son, for being. For bringing me into this dual conversation.

[38:19] ANTHONY MARTINEZ: It was fun. I love you.

[38:21] STELLA MEDINA: I love you very, very much, you and your brother, Mark Andrew Martinez, who's a teacher and you are an attorney. And I'm so proud because we came from, according to some lenses, from deficiently cultural backgrounds, but there is no such thing. We are who we want to become. And thank you again.