Patricia Garcia and Veronica Perez

[00:01] PATRICIA GARCIA: Hello. My name is Patricia Garcia, and I'm 42 years old. Today is January 7, 2023, and we are in El Paso, Texas, and I'm here with Veronica Vasquez Perez, my longtime friend and my business partner with Dirty Girls compost.

[00:19] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: My name is Veronica Vasquez Perez. I'm 41 years old. Today's January 7, 2023. We're in El Paso, Texas, and I'm here with Patricia Garcia, my long, long time friend and business partner for Dirty Girls compost. So, Pat, I guess I'm going to start.

[00:43] PATRICIA GARCIA: We'll start with these.

[00:44] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Is who has made the biggest impact on your life, and what's one thing that they've taught you?

[00:51] PATRICIA GARCIA: That's a very good question. Question. Because I have a very large family. So to say any, just one would not be accurate. I would say all of my family, from my oldest brother, who's 14 years older than me, to my closest sibling, who is two years older than me. So all of them have definitely had an impact on me. And I think also, of course, of course, my parents have definitely shaped me in some shape, some way or form throughout my entirety. But I will throw that question back to you.

[01:31] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Well, I was going to follow that with another question, but I would definitely say probably my dad's been my biggest influence for the better and for the worse. But oddly enough, I feel like it's been a lot of my male family members, like my grandpa, too, who instilled the humbleness and family here with us. And then my dad has taught me to not be scared. Just try it and go for it. And with both of those strong males, I think that's kind of helped bring us to the point where we're at in being humble, but also trying new things, like with our venture that we did here with the compost. And the crazy part is we grew up close to each other, and we still live close to each other in the same community. And. And it's pretty beautiful, I think, how just the closeness of our families on your other end, you know, have brought us to what we're doing today.

[02:48] PATRICIA GARCIA: Well, that's something that I think I wanted to talk about with you because, yes, we're doing this really awesome thing. So first I want to ask you about dirty girls compost, what it is, and then kind of go into why we do it, and that goes back to our community, our family, all of that stuff. So I'll just kind of say, why are we here today? Why are we talking about what we do?

[03:18] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I was thinking about that. I was reflecting on both of us moving back from Austin after we had been there for a long time, and we were back in El Paso. And I think like a lot of people who grew up in El Paso and then moved away in search of bigger, brighter things, who eventually ended up coming back to El Paso for who knows what reason. It's always almost family, but I was thinking about us coming back, and for a period, you're lost. You kind of remember who you were, and you forget who you were all at the same time. And I remember I moved back before you did. And when you moved back, I could see the frustration in your eyes.

[04:12] PATRICIA GARCIA: I was thinking about this the other day. I remember we wanted to do that podcast called border rejects because we were so frustrated with being here and trying to find jobs that were like, we worked so hard, and we came back and we felt so rejected by our home, and that sucked.

[04:35] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Yeah, it was kind of like you got punished for leaving, right? Like, everybody else who stayed here, they did their hard work, and. And they grew with the community, and we felt kind of like abandoners, and it felt like you were getting punished when you moved back because we didn't have any contacts here. We hadn't established any, you know, since we left high school. We both went to New Mexico State University, and then after that, we both went to Austin, and we were gone all that time, and we were in search of something else when we had to come back. I know for both of us, it wasn't really a choice that we came back. We came on hard times and for different reasons. We both ended up back here, and it did felt like we were being punished because we had deserted our motherland. And so I had felt that before you came back. I think you came back a year after I did.

[05:43] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah.

[05:43] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: And I could see I had those eyes. I cried so many nights just trying to find myself again.

[05:53] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah, it's crazy, too. We come back and we should feel like it's home. And when we would visit, it was great. But then you move back, and none of your friends are here, so you're like, what do I do? Not just like the friends that you had before you moved, but, like, your friends from Austin, right? They became like your family, but then even your friends from, like, high school, like, they weren't here anymore. So it was like, wow, I need to make friends. I'm an adult. I don't know how to do that anymore.

[06:26] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Or the ones that were here, they already had their. Their lives established. Yeah, they did already have their family. They were mostly teachers or border patrol.

[06:39] PATRICIA GARCIA: Right.

[06:39] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: You know, and so coming back to that, where do you fit? And I remember, and then at that same time, I still remember us thinking, you know, we're not doing anything here. We've gotten our education, we've gotten our life experience, and we're back here, back to zero. What do we do? Everybody else is living it. And then, especially in that time in 2019, everybody's got their side hustles, right?

[07:10] PATRICIA GARCIA: Right.

[07:11] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Social media is on full blast podcasts or all the rage Instagram. And so you see everybody hustling and bustling, and we're here twiddling our thumbs, thinking, well, what can we do?

[07:24] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. And that's when we kind of talked about starting something, right? I mean, initially, we started out, hey, let's do this program where we can get, like, everybody in the neighborhood to kind of donate a piece of their I. Their yard. And that's. That was, like, the cool thing about our neighborhood. So we live in shover park in El Paso, Texas. It's like, literally when we tell people it's at the border, it really is, like, the fence we can see from our house, we can see Mexico from our house. And so in that area, it was egg based. That park, before we, you know, before we were born, was all cotton fields.

[08:09] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Yeah.

[08:10] PATRICIA GARCIA: And so, like, yeah.

[08:11] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Driving down the border, there was nothing but cotton fields, especially by where the cemetery's at behind the Kennedys.

[08:20] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah.

[08:21] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I even want to say right there on the corner of Yarborough on the border, was that cotton fields?

[08:27] PATRICIA GARCIA: I think so. I mean, we could be wrong, but at least I know my mom said that the park was all filled, so I think that's. By the time I was born, it wasn't like that. It was a park. But even now, we still get irrigation, some of the houses. So it's a very ag based community. People, I think, in our generation moved away from that. I remember my grandma's house, which is, you know, in the same community. We would go over, and they had goats and chickens and rabbits, and so, you know, my grandma would make chicken soup, and it was really like, she got the chicken from her yard and made it that day, and I was like, ugh, I just want Campbell's. You know? Like, so I. Even in my time, I didn't appreciate it, but, like, that's what that community was. You know, that community where the middle school is at, that was a farm, you know?

[09:28] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Oh, yeah, the Deliswandos.

[09:31] PATRICIA GARCIA: And so when I brought up the idea of, like, hey, let's try to do something where we can get people to donate their front yards to, like, have little gardens. I thought it'd be perfect, because, again, it's like this neighborhood and area was Washington made for it, you know, like, it was all ag. So we were the lower valley, not like the pretty upper valley, but we still got all that, like, benefit from being located there.

[10:04] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Yeah. And whether we wanted to accept it or not, it was instilled in us since we were kids.

[10:11] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah.

[10:11] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I mean, I remember my grandpa would always have cilantro everywhere, and. And he'd be like, my aunts would be like, go get some cilantro for the rose. Okay. You know, when you're a kid, you don't appreciate anything. And so I like that deal. The front yard gardens. That was a good idea. But, I mean, it's just so much work. It was gonna be way too much work.

[10:40] PATRICIA GARCIA: That's when you brought up the idea about the composting.

[10:43] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Yeah. I had seen a program, and it was from these guys in Austin to the compost peddlers, I think.

[10:50] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah.

[10:51] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I mean, and you know what? If everyone's gonna call you trash, you might as well embrace it anyways, so.

[11:00] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah, that's how dirty girls compost came about. And I love this story because everybody really, really likes that name. Tell me. Tell me about the name, how it came about. And first, I would like to say that it's spelled a different way. Right. It's not just dirty girls compost.

[11:21] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Right. Right. It does take a little bit of. A little bit of the spanish language into it. It's dirt, e girl. So it's dirt. And, girls, if you're gonna translate into English. Uh huh. But that one came from my mom. My mom was the inspiration for this, for this name, because it was a January day, much like today, pretty cold outside, and she was making some chicken soup. And so I had just come inside from the garden, and I saw the pot of soup on the stove. And so after I washed my hands, I did wash them thoroughly. I put my hands on top of the pot to warm them up, and my mom looks at me. She said, get your dirty hands away from my soup. I was like, gosh, I wash my hands, mom. She's like, I don't care. Get them away. That's gross, you know, and so.

[12:17] PATRICIA GARCIA: And she called you pigpen, didn't she?

[12:19] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Yeah, she did. She called me pigpen. She still calls me pigpen. She says, get them away from my soup. You always bring dirt in everywhere you go. I mean, and that's the truth. I can't deny that. I always have. I mean, even right now, I have mud on my boots. But, um, yeah, so. So I don't know why I left earth. I left her house. And I was like, I'm not. I'm not pigpen, you know? And as I was driving, I was like, I'm not dirty. What's her problem? I was all dirty. And I don't know. We had been trying to figure out a name and, you know, just driving, it came to me. I was like, yeah, we're just two girls and we got some dirt under our fingernails, usually at all times. So that's how it came up. In all honesty, the name makes me cringe a little.

[13:10] PATRICIA GARCIA: Oh, for sure. When people are talking about, they kind of joke and they're like, oh, dirty girls. And I'm like, yeah, that's us.

[13:16] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Yeah, but, I mean, it's catchy.

[13:18] PATRICIA GARCIA: Very catchy. And there's a lot of fun puns you can make with it and all that fun stuff. But, I mean, so the general gist of what we do, I think, is a little bit different, right, from what we imagined in Austin. Right. That was like a whole big venture.

[13:38] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Oh, gosh. If I could go back and, you know, to that, those interview questions, when they ask you, what do you see yourself doing five years from now? Never. Never in a million years in five or ten years ago, would this have ever come out of my mouth. If somebody had asked you five years ago what you would be doing today, I mean, what would you have answered? I'm pretty sure it's not composting on.

[14:05] PATRICIA GARCIA: Saturday mornings, picking up trash with my son in my suv, which does not let out. Lots of smells. Yeah. No, it's been an interesting journey.

[14:20] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I picked up compost one time in my car, and I thought I was going to die. So, Miles, when you're finally older, you know, I already owe you an apology, because he's a trooper.

[14:34] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah.

[14:34] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Y'all are both troopers for picking it up in your car.

[14:37] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. And Alex, I have to give props to my husband, Alex, because he picks up when on those days that I can't. So I am truly, truly grateful to them both.

[14:50] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Yes, as am I.

[14:52] PATRICIA GARCIA: But. But Miles has started to protest. Didn't say he's not gonna go. And it's fair, because he sits closest to the compost. So he gets the bulk of the smell in the mornings on Saturday.

[15:06] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: So, yeah, I hope we haven't tarnished his idea of Saturday mornings.

[15:12] PATRICIA GARCIA: No, I think he'll look back on him and be like, that was cool. I actually really. When it doesn't smell, he actually really kind of enjoys it. But I wanna explain a little bit about what we do. This program is just for our neighborhood. We do it for free. We provide bins to our neighbors to collect their kitchen scraps throughout the week. And then we pick it up for them. We take it back to your yard because you have a big, large lot where you can store this stuff. And we just put them in a big pile, let it cook for about five or six months, and then we return that compost back to the folks who participate. And I think that's a really cool, cool little program. Again, it's free. We provide those bins for free. So everything is out of our pocket. It's out of our time and love and energy. But at the end of the day, we get this really cool product that's dirt that they can reuse to grow whatever they want. And that's in a very small way. We've never really quantified it. We've never weighed how much we really create and have saved from going to the landfill. But at the end of the day, we've done our very small part for our little neighborhood, which never gets any real good. Anything from. Doesn't get good practice, publicity or recognition.

[16:48] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I mean, and we don't do it for that.

[16:50] PATRICIA GARCIA: Right.

[16:50] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: It's just. It's just something, you know, when they say everybody can do something, it really is a true statement. I mean, not everybody can handle trash as awesome as we can.

[17:04] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. No, and I mean, it's cool because, again, it's for this part of the city that never gets anything. I mean, like I mentioned before, we don't even have, like, a Starbucks anywhere close to us. We have to really go far somewhere else to, like, go to any, like, store. There's no, you know, target below I ten. So if we want to go to somewhere other than Walmart, we have to travel. You know, we don't get the cool stuff in our part of the world.

[17:38] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: We don't even get the good stuff. I could be honest with that. Like, going to the grocery store, which is another big influence for starting this. This company. Because when you go to the grocery store and don't even have, like, a basic yellow squash or they don't have an eggplant. And then the worst part is when you ask the. The person working the produce section, excuse me, do you have any eggplant? And they ask you, what is eggplant? You know, we should know what an eggplant is? And that's the thing. We are deprived of a lot of basic produce and nutrition.

[18:22] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah.

[18:22] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: You know, basic produce and nutrition. And I don't want my nephews growing up thinking that they have to move out of that area because we don't get the basic needs or no basic items. My nephews, they'll tell you what an eggplant is. They won't eat it, but at least they know what it is because I grow it so that they can know and maybe have some sort of curiosity. But, yeah, I feel so blessed when I'm able to provide spinach and lettuce and good, healthy produce to my family.

[19:03] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. Well, that goes back to one time my dad was telling me they've lived there since probably late seventies or maybe mid seventies. But when my parents first moved in, my dad said they were growing asparagus, but he didn't know what it was, so he just mowed it down. He was like, oh, that's what it is like later in life.

[19:34] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: But it did grow in that area.

[19:35] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah.

[19:37] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: My dad said my grandma would send him out to go pick it in the canals. He's like, we didn't eat it and I didn't like it. I didn't know what it was, but we'd be sent out to go pick it in the canals. Yeah, my mom loved it.

[19:52] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. No, I love it now. These days, I'm like, dad, really? Like, I would have loved that. But, like, again, we just didn't grow up with that kind of stuff, you know?

[20:01] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Neither did I. I remember I didn't know what real spinach tasted like.

[20:08] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah.

[20:08] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Until I went to culinary school. Yeah, it was the Popeyes can, and it was all black and full of stems.

[20:13] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah.

[20:14] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: You know, and so I always thought spinach was really disgusting, and it was until I went to culinary school and I was like, what?

[20:21] PATRICIA GARCIA: This is.

[20:22] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: This is what spinach tastes like. It's amazing.

[20:24] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah, I love it. I love spinach. I love all that stuff. All the veggies. I wish now that I can make chicken soup with the chicken from outside, you know, that sort of thing.

[20:37] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Maybe one day. You never know.

[20:38] PATRICIA GARCIA: Oh, I'll still have to get somebody else to get me the chicken. I don't think I'll ever be my grandma who could handle that. Yeah, for sure. Somebody.

[20:48] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Oddly enough, that's on my bucket list.

[20:51] PATRICIA GARCIA: You can do it. You can do it.

[20:52] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Well, I mean, I feel like you have to push yourself a little to scary things.

[20:56] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah, well, it's fair. I mean, you should see where your food comes from and what the exact sacrifice is if you're gonna be eating meat.

[21:04] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I might turn vegetarian after that date.

[21:06] PATRICIA GARCIA: But, you know, it's.

[21:08] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: But it does come from somewhere. You should know where it's coming from.

[21:11] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I want to go back to talking about, like, so what we do, right? Obviously, we're composting, we think is a really great program for the neighborhood. But it goes back to what you were saying, not just, like, about your family, right. All these things you learned. But we didn't really put into play or practice until we got older and how they influenced us and how we grew up. I mean, again, I kind of like to go back to the whole idea of, like, self sustainability or just, like, practical, very simple things, simple recycling. You know, like, maybe we didn't call it recycling, but we learned it, you know? So I think that all goes back to kind of what we're doing, and we're hoping to get a community back to because we all did it. You know, it wasn't just our families. It was all the other families in the neighborhood. Whether it was because we could afford it or not, we had to reuse things or live very simply. So tell me a little bit about, like, what you think influences what we do now, like, how your family or what you learned influences.

[22:29] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Well, when we first started this in 2019, it was a little scary. You know, both you and I, neither of us are aggressive people at first. You know, I think at first, or we're naturally very shy, even to this day, in our fourth year, we're still a little shy about inviting people to the program. But I remember when we very first started with our first bin, and I didn't ask my mom because I'm not a person who likes asking. So I brought the bin into her house and I put it on her table, and I said, okay, you need to start putting your kitchen scraps in here. And she said, excuse me? I said, yeah, we're going to compost now. She says, what's that? I'm like, well, all the kitchen scraps, just put them in here. We're going to start collecting them. And, you know, so it started with her and my sister. My sister is always on board for new things and for new ideas. She's like, yeah, let's compost. So she took a bin also. And then I think your family took the third bin. And so it was kind of scary. So it started with just family again. And then from there, you know, I had envisioned the whole streets full of green bins, like the green rollaway carts that we had built and later got stolen. And whoever has those stolen carts, you know, if you're growing something in there, I hope they die, because we put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into those carts.

[24:08] PATRICIA GARCIA: They were very nice. I remember us sitting outside in your dad's yard making those, like, you know, screwing on the wheels and then painting them and then, you know, figuring out, okay, who we gonna give these to? How is it gonna work? All that stuff? It took. It took a long time. And it was your money. You paid for that, you know?

[24:33] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Yeah. I mean, and, you know, I had. Had envisioned that the whole streets, all of the Pasadel area was gonna be full of these green rollaway bins with compost in them. And then they all get stolen the first Friday.

[24:49] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. Yeah. That was so disheartening. But I kind of get it because, you know, we see.

[24:55] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: They look nice.

[24:56] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yes. And we see those trucks that drive every, you know, weekend just looking around for trash. And, yeah, to be fair, those first few bins, we did not say, hey, don't take these.

[25:08] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Right.

[25:09] PATRICIA GARCIA: But then it was when we actually painted on there, like, please don't take these. These are the property of the dirty girls compost.

[25:16] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: And they still took them.

[25:16] PATRICIA GARCIA: And they still took them. And that was like. That was. I was very mad, and I was thinking of ways of how we could track all those and make sure that even if somebody takes it, we would still be able to go and find them. But, you know, that's.

[25:30] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Yeah. A bigger person would wish kindness on them. Like, well, at least hopefully they're growing a tree, but I wish none of that on those people.

[25:39] PATRICIA GARCIA: That's fair. That's fair. But that. That also goes into, like, people don't realize how much effort and work and money and time it goes into it. They just think they're throwing out their trash. And it's not just that. Right? Those bins. Those. Those dog food bins that we use to collect them.

[25:56] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Yeah.

[25:57] PATRICIA GARCIA: People take those.

[25:58] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Yeah. With dirt. Yeah. With, like, moldy food in there.

[26:03] PATRICIA GARCIA: Slushy, moldy food that has been sitting there for a week or two.

[26:07] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: What goes on in their brain? I don't know.

[26:09] PATRICIA GARCIA: You know, maybe they just really need something for their. Their dog food.

[26:13] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I. Maybe. Or maybe their own compost. You know, if that's what's going on, then I wish a little bit of just, like, a sliver of positive energy towards him.

[26:24] PATRICIA GARCIA: So now we are. We call it a business, but it's not really a business because we don't make money from it and we don't charge people to participate. But I think now we're at a point where we can try to expand and make this a bigger thing. In the city of El Paso, again, not just our neighborhood, but in general, El Paso is never seen as a very great city. We're always like, you know, national attention is never for a good thing. Hey, the president's coming this weekend, and it's because, you know, there's a crisis here. There's a crisis here. And so I think that if we can manage to pull this off and make it bigger, like, how awesome would that be?

[27:14] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Right, right. Change the narrative. You can always change the narrative more than once, more than twice. There's no amount, but, yeah, that would be awesome. Yeah. When people say your business, I always like to tell them it's more of a project. I like to call it a community project.

[27:32] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah.

[27:33] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Because, you know, it's all experimenting. Some things work and some things don't, and that would be awesome. Like, if I were to ask you right now, in five years, what do you see this project turning into?

[27:50] PATRICIA GARCIA: Oh, Patricia I don't even know. I mean, I know right now we're still struggling to get people in our neighborhood. Right. That was always our point. We want our neighborhood to have something really cool. And we've had people from east side, west side who are like, yes, I'll do it. Yes, I'll even pay for it. But, like, I love that idea, and I love seeing people interested in composting. One do just, you know, the smallest thing. Right. I. To help their city or to do something better. But if you ask me where it will be in five years, I would love to have us have expended throughout the whole city. That's the dream.

[28:33] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Have different hubs. Right?

[28:35] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. Yeah, that'd be great. And more people in our neighborhood, I think right now, we're just still kind of going up against, like, people who won't necessarily pay for it and don't necessarily understand it. You know, we grew up in a mexican neighborhood, and we're not exactly the richest part of the city, so. And I don't. I don't want to say, like, our neighborhood is uneducated, but maybe we're just not exposed to some of these things. So if we could get the neighborhood to understand it a little more, I think we could have the whole neighborhood full of our bins.

[29:20] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: That would be nice.

[29:21] PATRICIA GARCIA: I would.

[29:21] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I would really enjoy. I would really enjoy getting to meet more of our neighbors.

[29:28] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah.

[29:29] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I think it's cool. I joke around. I say sometimes I feel like the fifties milkman because, I mean, and it's kind of weird because we don't have a lot of exposure to our neighbors. But on those quick 2 seconds, like, hey, how's it going? You know, it feels really nice. Like something as cheesy as a smile and a wave, and you're like, have a great Saturday. And, hey, thank you for those peaches.

[30:00] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. Yes.

[30:01] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I mean, how many people get to say that?

[30:04] PATRICIA GARCIA: It's definitely grown a little bit where I think we have built a small community in what we're doing, right? It's not just the compost. Like, you do gardening now, and you're part of this big gardening group here in El Paso. And so you've met people, and you've gone on and learned more about that. And then people give us gifts or they give us, you know, other produce that they've grown in their garden. So it's like, it's a gift giving all around. I love it. It's great.

[30:37] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Yeah. And it's with no strings attached. Like, there's no point. You know, I'm always just very grateful, even to the church community, because my mom's a very devout parishioner of our lady of the valley there. And when they're having their Gordita sales or their lettuce, I mean, excuse me, their enchilada sales, you know, they're there saving us the scraps of the onions and the flowers, too. Oh, yeah, the flowers, too. Uh huh. The flowers. We get a lot, and so. And I just think it's really cool how, like, the ripple effect, you know, you get to one person, and then that one person gets to another person, and people who didn't even know about composting and maybe don't even understand all of it, they. They still want to contribute and. And do it with their heart. You know, nobody's forced. I think that's what my favorite part of it is. It's done with your heart. Nobody's forcing you to do this.

[31:40] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. No, absolutely. And I remember the story of how you were telling or about one of our participants. His name is Emily. You know, at first she was like, that sounds dumb. And then now she's, like, one of our best participants and really wants to, like, fill her bin and eat better and fill it with all the veggie scraps and stuff like that. So that's cool. And even now, like, you know, people that I work with they want to participate somehow. Like, people want to participate, and they don't know how or why or to what capacity, but they want to be a part of it. Like, they see it as something. And I think we forget that. We forget, like, how cool it is. And I think we're humbled by it every time somebody asks us to participate in a, you know, a and, like.

[32:30] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: An educational forum or teaching the kids about worms and stuff. Yeah, I love it. Yeah, I love it. I'm humbled every time by it. And it makes me want to research more, and it makes me want to do better and have the answers that are asked.

[32:48] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah.

[32:48] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: You know, I'm still learning every day. We both are.

[32:52] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. No, for sure.

[32:53] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: But it's just been out of all the crazy adventures we've been through together over these past 25 years, you know, riding in cars with strangers and, you know, meeting Oscar de la Hoya, you know, this has probably been one of the craziest adventures, for sure.

[33:15] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. And I think that's cool. Like, I mean, we talk about growing up in our neighborhood, but, like, we've known each other since we were eight, seven, eight years old, playing sports with each other, going to the same school, going to the same church, knowing the same, you know, our siblings knew each other, that sort of thing. And, like, now here we are, you know, 20, some 30 years later, back in the same neighborhood, still friends and then still working together. I think that's really cool.

[33:47] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I mean, who else has that same narrative, you know? And I'm very lucky. I'm very lucky to have known you for that. And, you know, out of all the crazy things that I've done to make you angry at the same time and the same. That annoying little sister, you know, you never had, and I'm pretty glad you didn't have, you're like, well, at least I don't have to see her all the time. You know, it's been, it's just been such a blessing and amazing gift on your part that I've been able to benefit from.

[34:22] PATRICIA GARCIA: Oh, I appreciate that. I think it's been, I couldn't have done this adventure without you, so I appreciate you. And for our whole life, we went to NMSU together. We went to New Mexico together. Then we also went to Austin together.

[34:39] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Like, we survived a SWAT situation together.

[34:44] PATRICIA GARCIA: SWAT situation in Austin together.

[34:47] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Albuquerque.

[34:48] PATRICIA GARCIA: Albuquerque, which is a crazy town. I love Albuquerque, but it is a crazy town, and we survived it, and that's cool. So thank you, and I hope that we can keep getting bigger and stronger and that we'll be talking about this in 20 more years.

[35:06] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Absolutely. Absolutely. 2025 years. I want to be like, those are the trash ladies.

[35:14] PATRICIA GARCIA: Happy to be a dirty girl.

[35:15] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: I mean, that would be cool. Can you imagine if El Paso ever ends up having a composting citywide program? Citywide program. Like, that would be really cool.

[35:30] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah. And that would be something that we helped start. Like, whoa, that's really cool.

[35:36] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: Not the only ones, but we helped.

[35:37] PATRICIA GARCIA: Yeah, for sure. Yeah. We'll give a little love to green bins.

[35:42] VERONICA VASQUEZ PEREZ: All right. Well, I want to thank you, Patricia, for having me on this ride.

[35:48] PATRICIA GARCIA: Thank you, Veronica I appreciate your time, and I thank you.