Gone are the days of being able to go out whenever we felt like it.  Now, we have to come home to let her out.  No more opportunities to hit snooze on my phone and get another 15 minute worth of sleep.  Now, I wake up around 6:00, if not earlier, to let her out, feed her and wait for my wife to get ready and take over.  Now, we have somebody else to think about—a cute, furry chocolate Labradoodle.

Within those first challenging days, I was at my wit’s end one evening.  I think that I was alone watching her, when I felt like calling my mom.  Now, I call my parents a few times a week.  However, I had a particularly strong impulse to call her.  This call started like many others where we caught up on what was going on—in this case, she asked how it was going with the dog.  When I came to this moment, I had to come clean about the real reason for the call.  Without hesitating, I apologized to her for all of those times that I probably had her at her wits’ end.  She just laughed and told me that it was no problem.  No doubt that she had an inkling that I understood just a little bit of what she went through, when my stubborn streak challenged her.

In no way am I saying that a dog is exactly like a child.  However, there are similar experiences: having to adjust your schedule around feedings, providing bonding time or nursing back to health (she was recently spayed).  Without a doubt, I have encountered experiences that I wouldn’t have otherwise, felt things that I wouldn’t have and unlocked a nurturing side that has only recently been enhanced. I can only imagine how this would change if I was talking about a real child.

So from my limited perspective as a man and one that is not a father, I’d like to thank all the mothers out there (especially mine), the about-to-be mothers and those that can’t be mothers.  No matter what, we appreciate you, though we don’t always express this.  You are important and very necessary.  We would not be where we are without you.

Author: José A. Rodríguez

For one, there was the t-shirt that McConaughey was wearing that bore the caption, “i didn’t ask to b a Mexican.” What really drew me in was when he said, in Spanish, how he grew up in a mostly Hispanic town and learned Spanish through his friends. While his Spanish wasn’t the best, I understood the gist of what he was trying to say.

I thought to myself, “Matthew McConaughey could be a sign of the ‘New America.’” Here, we have a guy raised around people from another ethnicity (Latinos) in the United States, married to someone from another country (Brazil) and understands the basics of other languages (Portuguese and Spanish). From what I could see, he respects other cultures because he was raised around other cultures.

When you look at other cultures, not from the perspective of superiority but out of curiosity and respect, then you are able to appreciate different things that they might have to offer. I have been fortunate enough to travel to different countries including Mexico, Canada, England, France and, recently, Italy. That I can recall I have never had a single bad experience at the hands of any of these countries’ citizens. I have always shown them nothing but respect. If in a country where they speak a language other than English, I make an attempt to speak their language and, usually, I find that I am respected more for it. I don’t cram my Americanness onto them and I don’t force them to speak English in their own countries. I approach them out of respect.

We need to transcend this failure to communicate. People from other cultures aren’t the problem. The problem isn’t that people from other countries hate us. The problem is that we thrust our “Americanness” onto other countries and onto our own citizens—the school of thought that our country has no flaws.

We need to move past this failure to communicate. If there were more people like Matthew McConaughey who make an honest, earnest attempt to get past this failure to learn from other cultures, then our country could be the one that we all imagine it to be. Are we willing to make the attempt to communicate?

Author: José A. Rodríguez

One of the most welcome changes is some of the staff that has joined us, in addition to those people like Rhonda Gutierrez that have been with us:

• Paola Bravo
• Salvador Cid III
• Jerusalem Rivera
• Karla Casab
• Cintia Neary
• Luis Pugliese
• Beatriz Grissela Perez Molina

We have also had an assortment of guest writers and are thankful for all of the contributions that our friends and supporters have made, such as David London regarding the film/TV incentives and John Neary on what St. Patrick’s Day means to an Irish immigrant.

Besides working with some great people, Mi Estilo has also had the chance to get involved in some great collaborations:

• Covering events at the Fisher Theatre such as the Detroit run of In The Heights
• Interviewing David Lomeli, who performed in the Detroit Opera House’s Don Giovanni
• Being a media sponsor for Bravo Bravo 2010, Detroit’s hottest party in Detroit organized by the young professionals’ arm of the Michigan Opera Theatre’s Volunteer Association
• Being a media sponsor for the 2010 Center for Chicano-Boricua Studies Gala
• Being a media sponsor for the 2011 inaugural Detroit Salsa Awards

Nobody has any idea of what is in store for Mi Estilo, certainly not me.  In some ways, I’d have it no other way.  I look at how Mi Estilo began with the four of us and has grown into something embraced not just by Metro Detroit residents but also people around the world.  This is the beauty of an online publication―geographic limitations become a distant memory.  With the advent of social media, sharing information is as quick as a click or just hitting “share.”  Most importantly, I always look forward to reading your comments and finding out what your estilo is.  Just as in the beginning, we are a message away.

Author: José A. Rodríguez

Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock, this is the commercial that you need to see.  Initially, I thought that it was some type of apologist commercial defending Detroit—plain and simple.  However, I began to pay attention to the words and saw images of places that are so familiar to me.  I could feel our tough grit in those words.  I could feel pride starting to build.

Then, when I started to hear Eminem’s song, “Lose Yourself,” I thought to myself, “Great.  Chrysler picked the perfect song to go with the commercial.”  Now, I never imagined that Eminem, himself, would appear in the commercial, since he doesn’t do commercials (until Super Bowl Sunday—this one and the Brisk spot).  I saw him driving and passing through more recognizable landmarks and neighborhoods, until he pulled up to one of Detroit’s jewels, The Fox Theatre. Eminem walked up and through the theater, passing the black gospel choir and simply, yet eloquently summarized it all up: “This is Detroit.  This is what we do.”

I can honestly say that I was never prouder to be from Detroit.  Aside from what you might think about Eminem as an artist or as a person, he is one of the few celebrities to come out of the Detroit area that has exemplified our tough, gritty, hard-working work ethic and, most importantly, chose to stay.

At least for me, I look at this as a rallying cry.  I hear stories from people that are thinking about leaving or have left.  I don’t blame them for arriving to that painful moment.  At one point in my life, I could have taken that route.  However things, such as this magazine, happened for me that gave me the strength to remain behind, draw a line in the sand and declare that I would stay and fight for the City that I believe so strongly in and has given me so much.  I have been to other cities and, while I love visiting them, could never imagine living anywhere else.

Although I’m a native Detroiter, I was curious what people living elsewhere had to say.  I had the opportunity when I was following some of the conversations on Facebook.  One of the comments came from Tony in Miami who said, during the Super Bowl,

“I began to answer Jose’s question, and then stopped to read my friend Alex’s comment.  I couldn’t have said it any better.  Eminem has tremendous credibility with the youth market.  The man is a bonafide artist whose personal story is very much the story of Detroit.  I thought it was an impressive pairing and I believe Eminem will do more for the Chrysler brand than the government’s recent bailout.”

While this commercial is a great rallying cry, we shouldn’t look at it as the end but as the starting point.  As I was following the continued conversation on Facebook today regarding this commercial and its implications, someone said it perfectly.  Now that we are inspired, what will each of us to do improve Detroit and the rest of the region?

Author: José A. Rodríguez

In addition to seeing great things from one of our most popular writers, Rhonda Gutierrez, this year has seen us adding new personnel: Paola Bravo; Salvador Cid III and Karla Casab.  They have been welcome additions and have helped us to bring Mi Estilo to the next level.  Speaking of bringing it to the next level, keep your eyes opened for “Mi Estilo 2.0.”  If you like how it looks and feels now, you’ll dig it even more when we roll it out.

Mi Estilo has also been fortunate that we’ve become even more widely known by our Metro Detroit community.  Besides the fact that, on more and more occasions, I don’t even have to introduce the magazine because the people that I talk to say that they have heard of it.  This shows me that we are having increasing impact on the public.  A great example is the pulmonary fibrosis piece (You Can’t Take Them With You), which grew out of a comment to our writer, Rhonda Gutierrez regarding the issue.  I feel honored, when our readers feel comfortable enough to come to us and trust that we can bring a bigger voice to issues that are important to them.

While there have been successes, there have also been setbacks.  One that comes to mind is the recent defeat of the DREAM Act by Congress.  I was extremely disappointed by the actions of what I view as a cowardly Congress that didn’t think it was a serious enough issue to tackle.  While this has undermined my confidence in our politicians, it has reinforced my confidence in our ability to exercise our political rights to remove these people from office.  As we will have a new Congress, I am waiting to see what our politicians will do.

As Mi Estilo closes out 2010, I want to give my deepest thanks to our readers and supporters.  While this magazine began with the simple idea of providing a broad, progressive voice for Detroit area professional Latinos, we have grown into something bigger.  Thank you for reading.  Thank you for commenting.  Thank you for telling others about us.  Thank you for spreading the word. We would not be able to do what we do without you.  In 2011, Mi Estilo will keep working to produce the best online magazine possible and to keep maintaining the trust that you have granted us.  Thank you again. So now, let us see what 2011 will bring.

Author: José A. Rodríguez

Considering that Election Day just recently passed, one of the things that comes to mind is the fact that Latinos have been elected, irregardless of their political persuasion.  Latinos have been elected. During the times that the movie’s events took place, Latinos couldn’t even vote. Well…..they could…..if they could pay the poll tax.  For some of the poor families that earned perhaps $18/month, it would cost around $1.75 to vote.  Before this movie, I thought that this was something that affected African-Americans more.  I had no idea that it also affected Latinos.   Now, I can no longer say that I was that naïve.

On the way home from the movie screening, my dad shared a personal story that helped to show me how my family was affected.  He told me about how he was visiting his cousin down in Texas.   Dad came up during the 1950s and always lived in the Midwest.   However, on this occasion, he was visiting his cousin and they decided to take the bus.   Innocently, Dad tried to go to the front of the bus only to have his cousin tell him to move himself to the back.  Thank God that he eventually did go to the back.   Since Dad lived in the North, his experience was different from his cousin’s down south.   He experienced relatively little discrimination back then and I did while growing up.  For me, discrimination was something that I read about in textbooks, not something that I had experienced.

I carry with me the rallying cry that the film’s director gave his audience.  He told us to make sure that our voices are heard.  We need to make sure that there are shows that depict us as something other than gardeners, cholos or maids.   We need to work so that we can achieve executive-level positions so that we can effect decisions that affect our lives.  If the media isn’t speaking to us, then we need to create things like Mi Estilo.   Yes, things have changed and, for some of us, we have opportunities that our parents or even grandparents couldn’t have conceived.  However, we cannot grow lazy and complacent. We can look at how far we’ve come, but let us not forget that we still have further to go.

Author: José A. Rodríguez

For us at Mi Estilo, this is a question that we’re constantly answering.  From the beginning, one of our focuses was to make our site very smartphone and mobile friendly.  Think about it: sometimes when presenting an online magazine, we may not be near a computer to present it in action. It’s an unfortunate reality.  However, it’s nothing to whip out an iPhone or Blackberry to show off the site.  Now, with tablet PCs, it’s even easier to demonstrate Mi Estilo because we’re demonstrating its full functionality but without having to lug around a full-sized laptop.

So as more and more technology is moving into the mobile arena, I’m really interested to hear how companies and freelancers are using mobile technology to sell themselves or to show off their website.  I anticipate that they’re not doing things much differently than us.  While I am sure that passing out business cards will continue to remain an essential part of networking and outreach, I feel that, as time goes on, mobile technology will also play a complementary role if not surpassing business cards in importance.

Author: José A. Rodríguez

Graphics: Salvador Cid III

The thing about networking using social media is that you can’t go into it hiding everything about yourself and expect people to respond.  Don’t get me wrong.  I don’t think that you should share everything.  However, how do you expect anybody to reach out, when they can’t even know you?

For me, learning about someone is essential to my networking.  Many of the people in my network are there for a reason.  I don’t need to be “Mr. Popular” so I don’t need to get maxed out.  As a matter of fact, I’ll occasionally weed through my list. So when I learn about a person prior to making actual face-to-face contact, there has already been some rapport set up.  By this point, I have either commented on a person’s status, exchanged messages or chatted.  Often, when we finally make contact, I usually salute them with, “So finally we get to meet!”

What I would suggest is that, if you do take the plunge and use social media, remember to balance privacy with openness. If you disclose too much, you run the risk of having what you say bite you in the ass.  If you protect too much, then, odds are that nobody will “network” with you outside of the people that you may already know.  So before you open an account or start a profile, ask yourself, “What do I want others to know about me?”

Author: José A. Rodríguez

My wife and I stayed in an all-inclusive five-star hotel that was simply amazing.  We had a butler on-call, free access to their gourmet restaurants, and golf-cart shuttles to get us around the huge complex.  The bartenders used tongs to handle everything from the ice to the straws.  For someone not used to this, it was a bit overwhelming.

As we spent our honeymoon, I came to meet some of the employees who we kept running into time and time again.  As soon as I spoke to them in Spanish, there was an intimate rapport that was established.  In getting to know them and by watching them work, I thought to myself, “This person really busted their ass.”  As a result, my wife and I made it a point of tipping them well.

During one of our gourmet dinners, we ended up talking with our waiter.  He told us how he came up from Mexico City and now lives in Cancún. While our waiter didn’t say, my guess is that he moved to get work at the resorts.  Despite having a job that he likes, our waiter hardly his sees wife or nine year old step-daughter.  Despite it all, he sees something in his job that justifies being away from his family — all in the name of providing them with a better life.

My wife and I also had a chance to meet an older couple from Ann Arbor, who I’ll call Tom and Susan. Tom told me about something that he witnessed at the hotel that put things into perspective.  He was walking when he saw one of the guests just chewing out an apologetic hotel employee.  We talked about how the hotel’s service is very seductive, since neither of us are really accustomed to such service.  He pointed out that, when you’re not used to such things, you can easily get a big head and think that you could do anything that you want.  Instead of treating the employees like human beings, it’s easy to think that you own them.

Tom’s big point is that, despite the fact that the employees are probably paid peanuts (perhaps $6-7/hr plus tips), for many of the employees their pay is probably a small fortune.  Many like our waiter leave what they know in order to get something better for themselves and, sometimes, their families.  They’re happy with what they’re paid and settle.

As we were talking, a crazy idea popped into my head.  With all of this discussion about illegal immigration, should the best person no matter who they are get the job? I’ll tell you.  I’ve stayed at a number of different places and nothing compared to what I saw at our resort.  Even Tom, a non-Latino, saw the same thing as me.  The strange thing about my proposition? Tom agreed with me.

I’m not going to pretend to have all the answers to illegal immigration, which in my opinion hasn’t been addressed by the current administration. When it does come up, it’s only to raise one’s own political credibility or try to bring down that of the “opposition.”  We, as a country, are still benefiting off of the backs of illegal immigrants. Ask yourself, “What would possess someone to give up everyone and everything that they know and risk their lives to cross the border just to earn more money than they could expect at home?”

In my opinion, I think that our solution will ultimately start with punishing the employers that hire the workers and exploit them, developing a guest worker program and (the hardest part) having some type of legalization.  Discussing and, ultimately, resolving this issue will involve having a truly open discussion and being open to all options, until we ultimately arrive to a solution that works.  Let’s change the situation so that these workers don’t have to sacrifice their lives so that we can live ours.

Author: José A. Rodríguez

About halfway through my trip, I’d made my way from Paris to Normandy. One of the sites that we stopped off at was Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial (http://www.abmc.gov/cemeteries/cemeteries/no.php). Just over 50 years prior to my visit, this place was the site of one of the most pivotal battles during World War II-the Normandy invasion, which opened up Europe and contributed to Allied victory. Even more so, it was the site where a tremendous number of our young soldiers gave their lives for our freedom.

Now imagine a 17 year old visiting this site and being among its sea of immaculately laid out tombstones, its blanket of green grass and feeling a soothing salty breeze. It truly was something to admire. What hit me more than the beauty that I experienced was what our tour guide told us. She told us that many of our soldiers were right around my age. Now for a carefree teenager to hear that the people buried just under his feet were not much older than him brings him closer to reality than almost nothing else.

Since that summer day that seems like it was just yesterday, I remember our veterans. No matter what my views are on how just a war or “conflict” might be, I recognize just how much they give up for us. I even make it a point of just saying thank you. A few years ago when I was in a customer service job, I had a veteran at my counter on either Veteran’s Day or Memorial Day. When I saw that he was a veteran, I did the simple thing of saying thank you. He told me, “Nobody’s ever said that to me.” So when you come across a veteran, remember to tell them thank you.

Author: Jose A. Rodríguez