La Fighter

Seven years ago in Massachusetts when I was a features reporter at The Boston Globe, I saw some of the scenes that were filmed for a PBS documentary called "Rebel" about Loreta Velazquez,  a Cuban-born woman who dressed like a man and fought for the Confederacy. 

The documentary is done and airing 10 p.m. on WPBT2 May 24 (and other PBS stations nationally). 

Here's my then Globe story about the making of the program. The people I interviewed in the story are featured in the documentary.  It's nice to see the production come full circle.

Stealth fighter

This Cuban woman toiled as a man in the Civil War. So why has no one heard of her?

By Johnny Diaz, Globe Staff  |  August 22, 2006

Loreta Janeta Velazquez sounded like a mythical figure: a Cuban-born woman raised in New Orleans, where she masqueraded as a male soldier and fought in the Civil War. With a fake mustache, beard, and a soldier's uniform, the Latina enlisted in the Confederate Army in 1861 as Lieutenant Harry T. Buford , without her husband's knowledge.

``When I heard about Loreta, I was like, ` Why would a Cuban woman join the Confederacy? What is a Velazquez doing in 19th - century America?' " says Maria Agui Carter , a filmmaker and former producer for WGBH-TV (Channel 2).

That intrigue led Carter on a historical and personal journey into the life of this un- Southern belle.

Carter learned that Velazquez didn't just fight as a soldier in the historic battles of Bull Run and Shiloh, but posed as a spy after she was wounded during service. Velazquez chronicled her adventures as a soldier in a 600-page memoir called ``The Woman in Battle: The Civil War Narrative of Loreta Janeta Velazquez, Cuban Woman and Confederate Soldier." The book, brought back into print three years ago, features rare images of Velazquez as both a woman and a man.

Velazquez's colorful unsung life had the makings of a good documentary film, Carter thought. And so ``Rebel" was born.

Star Trek, My Generation

In honor of the new Star Trek movie Into Darkness which I saw this past weekend, I thought I'd repost a blog entry about how the Enterprise and crew beamed into my life.

Johnny's personal log: Stardate Oct. 20, 2011

A lot of my friends and readers have been surprised to learn this year that I'm a diehard Star Trek fan. (I hate the word Trekkie.) I never talked about it because Trek fans get such a bad (read:geeky) rap so I always kept it on the down low. But with the release of my fourth novel, Take the Lead, I've been slowly coming out as a wanna-be member of the Enterprise crew because like me, the main character in the book loves Star Trek and Gabriel references several episodes and characters as he narrates his story. (The walls of his fictional apartment in Quincy are covered with Star Trek cast posters.)
My interest in the show began when I was a kid in Miami Beach. I always saw the original show with Kirk, Spock, Bones, Uhura, Scotty and Sulu on reruns on Miami's WCIX-TV (Channel 6). When the crew embarked onto the silver screen with Star Trek: The Motion Picture, I followed them there (at least on cable because I was too young to go the movies.) But it wasn't until junior high that the show sunk its hooks into me like a tractor beam. From then on, my interest in the program boldly soared. On Memorial Day weekends, WCIX would air day-long Star Trek marathons which allowed me to have a better understanding of the show and its message. I would sit glued in my Miami Beach childhood bedroom where I watched back-to-back adventures of starship NCC- 1701. For me, it wasn't so much about the limited special effects (photon torpedoes, phasers, beaming up and down from the various colorful alien planets) although I did enjoy seeing these effects.
Rather, the characters were the strongest appeal of show. Whether it was the series or the films, it was fun watching these characters discover something new about each other each week. I enjoyed their light-hearted banter and the chemistry between actors. They were a family, a group of friends in good and bad times. I wished I had had that at Nautilus Junior High when I began to realize that I was different from my other classmates, that I was gay. I did have a big Cuban family but I didn't have a tight group of friends to hang out with on weekends, to go to the movies at the Byron Carlyle theater or to shop at the ever-popular Aventura Mall. I was pretty much a loner, riding my orange ten-speed bike in mid-Miami Beach on weekday afternoons and weekends hoping for some company from anybody from school I might bump into. I was secretly hoping for my own starship wingman, my tween Mr. Spock.

Although I had friends in school, they were just that at the time - classmates. Nothing really happened outside of school except studying for honors Algebra, honors Geometry or helping one or two classmates with their English essays. Sometimes I pretended that I needed help with my math just to hang out. I always wanted to go to the movies with them or hang out at the mall but they were girls and had girl things to talk about such as boys and other monthly-related girly things and I wasn't part of that conversation. even though I desperately wanted to share with them which guys I thought were cute too. I didn't have any guy friends at the time either. I tried opening up a hailing frequency but my messages went unanswered.

So there I was, sitting on my twin bed, escaping to the Enterprise, wishing I was onboard and on a voyage with my own Spock, Bones, Uhura. Friends. Community.
I remember that year, I had a Star Trek calendar, marking off the date to the premiere of the new movie, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (better known as the humpback whale movie.)I remember how excited I was to watch the cast on the red carpet premiere on Entertainment Tonight. I felt like I knew the cast. They were my long-distance friends and I was happy for their 20th anniversary since the show's debut.
My love for Star Trek cruised into high school, particularly freshman year with the debut of Star Trek: The Next Generation. I had to be home at 7 p.m. Saturday nights to watch this new crew continue its ongoing mission of the original series. I wanted to be like the teen starship savant Wesley Crusher who was about my age and became part of the missions and helped in any way that he could. Dammit, he got to wear the uniform and hang out on that ship. (okay, Hollywood set.) Every weekend, my mom would bring me a cheeseburger, fries and chocolate shake from my dad's job at Puerto Sagua restaurant in South Beach. I would sit down in the living room and watch the show with glee and talk back to the characters."Make it so!" or "Blow the Borg out of the galaxy, Picard!" Yes, the show was the highlight of my weekends and my week.

Eventually, I got my driver's license, bought my first car (a used light-blue Honda Accord hatchback) and began interning at The Miami Herald at 16. I finally created my own circle of friends but I couldn't outrun (out-fly?) my love for Next Generation. I also discovered Deep Space Nine in college and then tuned into Voyager. No matter what stage I was in life, I couldn't escape my fondness for my extended Star Trek familia. When the Next Generation cast made the leap to the big screen in 1996 in First Contact, I was there too in the theater and on those other Friday nights for each of the following movie premieres. This happened as recent as May 2009 when the latest Star Trek movie opened here in Boston. I remember sitting mid-row, munching on popcorn in the theater where I was all giggly and giddy, as the familiar theme music played. For me, that introductory music was akin to a feel-good pop song.

Although I've never lost the appeal for the show/movies, I just never shared it outloud with anyone, not my friends, my boyfriends or co-workers at The Miami Herald where I first started my journalism career. (There were hints though: I had a keychain shaped like a Star Trek communicator and I had a bumper sticker that read: STARFLEET ACADEMY.) Being a Star Trek fan was my own little secret and one that I've finally decided to finally come out and share with others. Still, I continue my search for my Spock. And it turns out, he's one of us afterall.

In that spirit, I am posting a small feature I wrote during my first-year as a full-time general assigment reporter at The Miami Herald's Broward city desk in Hollywood, Florida. Saturdays were considered slow news days, meaning that if there wasn't a shooting, robbery, drowning, murder, plane crash, hurricane or flood to cover, we'd write about a local festival or unique community event for that Sunday paper. (I loved working Saturdays back then with my boots-wearing-way-too-cool-and-fashionable-to-be-an editor Julie Gallego and fellow medical writer extraordinaire Shari Rudavsky. We were the Saturday crew for a while.) In August 1997, there was a mini-Star Trek event at one of the Broward county libraries and I gladly volunteered to do the feature (I always preferred features to hard news.) I extracted the story from The Miami Herald archives this week. Enjoy! I surely did then and now.

Review of "Looking for The Gulf Motel"

Like Miami, Richard Blanco's writing is lush and seductive, crackling with a sophisticated sensuality.
Blanco's prose glows like a slow burning Key West sunset in his newest book of poetry Looking for the Gulf Motel. As in his other collections, Blanco escorts the reader on a rich spiritual journey of self-discovery as he seeks to understand his complicated Cuban past and present. For so many Cubans, the crocodile-shaped island is a virtual country, one that many generations can't help but wax rhapsodic over after hearing their parents' stories. Or as Blanco writes "still trying to reach that unreachable island within the island...I thought I was done with Cuba, tired of filling the blanks, but now I'm not so sure" he writes in "The Island Within" p. 16.

Blanco's writing sparkles with the details of everyday life from Miami to Maine and anyone who has lived or visited those places will instantly recognize Blanco's spot on descriptions. There's his childhood living room where he "sat along for hours with butterflies frozen on the polyester curtains and faces of Lladro figurines'' to "the White Mountains etched in my living room window" as Blanco prepared to cook with his mom during her visit to Maine.

Seashells (que South Florida!) serve as literary devices that split the book into three sections - Blanco recalling vacations in South Florida (hence The Gulf Motel) ; how he wrestled with his homosexuality as an effeminate kid in a Latin household; and how as an adult, he tries to come to terms with his triple identity - Cuban, American, gay man.

Blanco in Fort Lauderdale last month

Although the settings change, the poems share a common theme - the meaning of home and how those places and the people in them intertwine and shape who we are, from childhood to adulthood.
A recurring character: Blanco's watchful abuela!
One particular poem, "Queer Theory: According to My Grandmother" (p.34) stood out for me. It's an ode to Blanco's late grandmother who verbally scolded him for being who he was - a gay Cuban boy and young man in Miami. (Something I related to growing up as a budding writer in Miami Beach.)

Blanco lists all the do's and don'ts - the pato commandments - that his grandmother barked at him:
"Stop eyeing your mother's Avon catalog, and the men's underwear in those Sears flyers. I've seen you.''
"Stop click-clacking your sandals - you're no girl."
"Don't stare at the The Six Million Dollar Man. I've seen you.''
"you will not look like a goddamn queer, I've seen you...even if you are one."

In a similarly-themed poem, "Afternoons with Endora'' (p. 33) Blanco recalls being "a boy who hates being a boy who hates cats and paint-by-number sets." He describes how he enjoyed watching "Bewitched" and wished he had Samantha's wiccan powers so he can be whom he really was.

In one scene, he uses his make believe powers to make his grandmother vanish.
" poof- she disappears in a cloud of smoke, leaving me alone in my room again, the boy afraid of being a boy, dressed like a witch, wanting to vanish too."
That soulful (and bittersweet) sharing has become a hallmark of Blanco's writing which is intense and muscular (like Blanco!)

My only critique is the length -- it's a small book(let) with 81 pages. So a reader should treat the volume as a delicious cup of cafecito from Versailles in Little Havana. Breathe in the brew's aroma, sip s-l-o-w-l-y, savor each drop ... and make each page last.

Blanco signing books at Museum of Art in Fort Lauderdale.

Juan Ponce, forever young

 
2013 marks the 500th year since Juan Ponce de Leon claimed Florida for Espana. There are so many events taking place in Florida to salute Ponce de Leon's expeditions.  This is my article on why Ponce is hot. 

Computer, where am I?

Has your car's GPS sent you to a wrong address? Here's my story on how some navigation systems can get us lost.

Cross country social media roadtrip

Who wouldn't want to do this? A twenty-something couple, John Ellis of WPalm Beach, and Laura Preston, are traveling around the country in an Airstream trailer. But their destinations are determined by people who suggest and vote on where they should go via their website. Here's my article on their crowdsourcing adventure

Say hello to Scarface, 30 years later

This month 30 years ago, crews came to South Florida to film some scenes for "Scarface." The movie still has relevance among today's movie-going audiences. Here's my Sun Sentinel article on Scarface's enduring appeal. The story includes an interview I did with Cuban-American actor Steven Bauer who played "Manny," Tony Montana's best friend in the film. (For you Miami readers, Bauer will always be "Joesito" from the classic PBS bilingual show "Que Pasa USA?" A big thanks to Bill from the Random Pixels blog for help with the piece.

Juggling different themes in Beantown Cubans

I recently found these videos where I talk about writing about themes of loss and good friendships in Beantown Cubans, my third novel which was set in Boston.



Open Road Media: Johnny Diaz on Beantown Cubans from Open Road Media on Vimeo.
Open Road Media: Johnny Diaz on Special Themes from Open Road Media on Vimeo.