Canto CDXXVIII: 25 Years a Reporter

Gentle cabrones:

The headline — “Pete Weelson! Eeeeek!” — is inelegant and a tad racist. The date it published — Nov. 23, 2000 — was 25 years ago this week. The story that went with it — an examination of how Democrats in California used the spectre of former California Gov. Pete Wilson to scare Latinos away from the GOP and little else — isn’t well written but hella prophetic and sums up its author’s career.

It was my first paid journalism story.

I’ve been a reporter for 25 years.

FUUUUUCK.

I’ve been doing this long enough that my career is longer than the lifespan of most of the students that I teach. I’ve been doing this long enough that the parents of some of my students tell them to tell me that they were fans of mine going back to when they were in college. I’ve been doing this long enough that there have long Hall of Fame careers by athletes in the four major American professional sports whom I had no idea existed until I started playing Immaculate Grid (Canto CCCLXXIV) because I was too busy to pay attention to the rest of the world – damn, I wish I saw Marc-André Fleury in action back in the day.

But I’ve been…busy for 25 years.

That article in the Infernal Rag happened after months of me feeding the Infernal Rag ideas after a fake angry letter to the editor caught their attention. That article came out in the same issue as a cover story about the El Cargadero Social Club, the hometown benefit association from my mom‘s ancestral rancho, written by Nick Schou, who would go on to become my managing editor and forever compa. Both of those articles led to founding editor Will Swaim suggesting I do another story for them – about the lucha libre matches happening at the Anaheim Indoor Swap Meet, which would publish two days before my 22nd birthday, although maybe a quarter of the words are actually mine.

That article led to another led to a full-time part-time food critic position led to a staff job led to The Former Columna led to managing editor led to Mexican-in-Chief led to the Remierda Incident led to the cantos led to the Los Angeles Times led to the Current Columna — and a HELL of a lot in between.

That Nov. 23, 2000 article. A epoch-altering event worthy of Chicxulub.

I never play what-if? with my life because it’s pointless and a waste of time. But since few of ustedes are reading on Thanksgiving weekend, might as well!

If my Pete Wilson analysis hadn’t published, I would not have become a reporter, period. When it published, I was starting my senior year in Chapman, having switched from film to film studies because I didn’t see a way forward but was too afraid to switch majors altogether in my last year. I was in the process of applying to UCLA grad school — the only grad school I applied to because I was too afraid of leaving my home, even though I had no real desire to stay in Orange County although I was starting to get involved politically.

I was applying for a master’s degree in Latin American studies with no idea what to do with it or after. I probably would’ve continued to get my doctorate — probably in history, because I’ve always loved the subject. But I would’ve been miserable in academia, as I would find out my second quarter — and even if I wasn’t, I wouldn’t have been comfortable leaving home for another college, which is what all academics must do in the search for tenure. So I probably would’ve dropped out and maybe ended up a truck driver like my dad because there would’ve been no other job prospects for me.

Or maybe I would’ve stuck at the collection agency where I was working as a data monkey while attending Chapman, because they saw managerial skills in me that I hadn’t seen and offered me a path forward as a manager a few months before I graduated from Chapman.

25 years a manager at a collection agency. PASS.

Maybe I would’ve stuck with politics — after all, I found out about the Infernal Rag in the first place because I was volunteering on a political campaign at the time and I was at the Election Night party for the Dems in 2000 where the atmosphere was ecstatic until we heard about Florida and a fog of confusion spread around the crowd, whom quickly left. Or maybe I would’ve inquired about the Catholic priesthood since I had no romantic prospects at the time and didn’t ever imagine I would because I’m a nerd like that and I have always felt a calling to help others. Or maybe I would’ve married young and had a big family because I was Catholic like that.

I would have certainly not known almost all of you. I would’ve been a very private person. I probably would’ve been more conservative than who I am today, although I don’t think I would’ve ever voted for Trump.

I did none of that. Instead, I became a reporter.

25 years.

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Everything in my life I owe to my career choice. Everything in my life I owe to a 22-year-old Mexican with glasses whose only journalism training was reading old Sports Illustrated from eighth grade (Canto CXXIII) and who was bold enough to think, “Sure, I could try journalism as as a career with only one Chapman Panther opinion piece and two Orange County Register op-eds for clips — what do I have to lose except, well, everything?”

25 years a reporter.

I joined a profession that was already dying, even though no one knew it then. The dailies were near the height of their power. The Infernal Rag was five years away from its financial heyday. We all still used Yahoo! as our search engine at that point and AOL IM. Because how I came in — knowing absolutely nothing as I tried to join a newsroom filled with geniuses and thus, having everything to prove all the time and no chance to fail — I created a moral code for myself that I have never forsaken, nor will never forget.

The bravery of that young nerd! The will. Never the cockiness, no matter what people may say – that’s a canto for another time. The eagerness.

It cost me my old life, a life I was never happy with. A life of doubt, rejection, and malaise. Instead, that 25-year-old article opened up the opportunity to do the things I always dreamed of doing in high school but never thought I could ever attain. Travel the country. Have a career based on reading. Have a house with a room dedicated to my books. Help out my parents. A wonderful wife. And get paid for it all.

Being a reporter even allowed me to go back to the two things I once thought I wanted to do full-time. I failed in Hollywood and never regretted my decision to join journalism during my time there. And for nearly eight years, I’ve been able to teach classes at the community college or university level, a job I absolutely love it but I’d never do full time because I want to focus on the teaching and not petty academia bullshit.

Random fact: I was thisclose to applying to the North Bay Bohemian. Imagine me in Healdsburg?

Gabriel García Márquez always considered himself a reporter instead of a novelist. He spoke a bit about it in a famous Paris Review interview that I can’t access and thus can’t quote the part about about how he called being a reporter a vocation but which I’m partially able to quote from — “I've always been convinced that my true profession is that of a journalist” — because I did a segment on All Things Considered about that interview when Gabo passed that I totally forgot about until now because I only remember my printed work not my audio stuff but fuck have I done a bunch of stuff in my 25 years AND I was about to be in conversation with his son, Rodrigo García, this summer about his short, lyrical crónica about the deaths of his parents and did I mention Gabo said journalism is a vocation?

I digress.

My mami, God bless her, knew that journalism was It for me. She glued my first Infernal Rag article, the pay stub for the $75 I got for it, and the mailer that inspired the whole thing to a poster board, then framed it herself because she was so creative and loving like that. I still have it, of course, although I need a new frame for it.

My mami loved Thanksgiving. I loathe it. But she didn’t raise no fookin’ ingrate, so let me use this canto to say I’m forever grateful to all who have accompanied me on this unlikeliest yet seemingly predestined of journeys, whether you’ve known me when I was just Gus (Canto XLV) or if you just signed up this week to my newsletter. To the people who have let me tell there stories, and the haters who tried to trip me up along the way. My jefes and jefas and colleagues and those closest to me, those who knew me before the Infernal Rag — the ones who always get mad I don’t hang out with them more but secretly are proud that I’m still doing my own thing and offering no Rupologies but forever a nice guy who shows up when needed.

This career has flown by so fast — I didn’t even talk about the 3.3 books, because there’ll probably never be another one so I really don’t consider myself an author — that I still think I’m a newcomer and always will, and so should you (Canto LXIV). It made me the happiest person professionally you will probably ever meet. Luck doesn’t even begin to describe what my career has seen. A newspaper took a chance on an angry letter writer. An editor created a brilliant idea and gave it to his young reporter. A reporter was intrigued enough about that upstart to write a front-page story that changed everything.

25 years of this. To 25 years more, or even just one more year, or even just one more byline — I never take any of this for granted, and I never will.

Thank you, todos.

Enough sentimentality – back to WERK. 

**

Enough rambling. This was the semana that was:

IMAGE OF THE WEEK: The Faboo, a cocktail made with watermelon juice, tequila and Tajín created by my cousin Plas. Perfect for summer!

QUOTE OF THE WEEK: “Today’s builders of Babel tell us that there is no room for losers, and that those who fall along the way are losers. Theirs is the construction site of Hell” — Pope Francis

LISTENING: “This Land Is Your Land,” Trini Lopez. American Routes said this swinging remake of the Woody Guthrie standard was “Latin-tinged,” but how so? I hear Johnny Rivers, I hear Don Ho, I hear the go-go 1960s and an artist that doesn’t nearly get enough attention today but was great enough that the Beatles opened for him. Someone blast it in front of Stephen Miller and tell him to remigrate DEEZ NUTZ. Hence included in Gustavo Arellano’s Weekly Radiola of Randomness YouTube songlist, where I’ve included every song I’ve ever featured in a canto — give it a spin!

READING: “Granddaughters of the Clay: A Family Legacy of Pueblo Pottery”: I have plugged Craftsmanship Magazine before, and I’ll plug them again because I’ve learned so much about different crafts from around the world. This particular article, though, is what we used to call a format buster: part memoir, part history, part photo essay, absolutely beautiful and brilliant.

BUY MY NEW CO-BOOK! People’s Guide to Orange County tells an alternative history of OC through the scholarship and reporting of myself, Elaine Lewinnek, and Thuy Vo Dang. There’ll be signings all year — in meanwhile, buy your copy TODAY. And, yes: I’ll autograph it!

Gustavo Events  

Dec. 5, 6 p.m.: I’ll be in short conversation with El Martillo Press publisher Matt Sedillo after his great tribe of contributors read at The Untold Story, 301 N. Anaheim Blvd., Ste. D, Anacrime. Reading, FREE; books, BARATO.

Dec. 6, 11 a.m.: Join me as I get FAAAAAADED with Lalo Alcaraz as he sells copies of his 2026 calendars along with his legendary prints at my honey’s Alta Baja Market, 201 E. Fourth St., Ste. 101, SanTana. Hanging out, FREE; booze and calendars, BARATO.

Dec. 14, 2:45 p.m.: I'll be in conversation with Ilan Stavans and Margaret Boyle, co-authors of the spectacular Sabor Judío: The Jewish Mexican Cookbook at the Skirball Cultural Center as part of their Hannukah Festival, 2701 N. Sepulveda Blvd., Los Angeles. $20 — but that get you access to the full festival!

Gustavo in the News

“The Democrats Taking the Fight to ICE”: Haven’t been in The New Republic in a while, if ever.

“Letters to the Editor: Businesses shouldn’t be able to take advantage of immigrants with low wages”: Los Angeles Times readers respond to a columna of

“Duane Roberts, Father of the Frozen Burrito, Dies at 88”: I get quoted in a Wall Street Journal obituary.

“Una conversación entre amigos se convirtió en la Fall Fiesta.“: They have Spanish-language journalism at Western Kentucky University? WHOA…

“New Mexico's Joe Kapp led Vikings to Thanksgiving Day victory, Super Bowl IV”: An appreciation I did about The Toughest Chicano from a few years ago gets a plug.

“What We’re Thankful For”: The editorial staff at the Chicago Maroon, the student paper of the University of Chicago, shout me out for visiting them a few weeks ago — very kind!

Gustavo Stories 

“Grítale a Guti”: Latest edition of my Tuesday night IG Live free-for-all.

“San Clemente could have federal cameras near its coastline”: My latest KCRW “Orange County Line” commentary talks about the literal Deep South of OC cozying up to la migra.

The Uprooted: I appear in this documentary short about the Dodgers and the communities that once lived where Dodger Stadium now stands.

“Ask a Californian: Home (?) for the Holidays”: My latest “Ask a Californian” co-columna for Alta Journal is Thanksgiving-themed, of course. KEY QUOTE: “Don’t cry if your sister-in-law ain’t serving pumpkin pie, the Visalia of the dessert world.”

“The ex-landscaper behind the deportation diary L.A. never wanted”: My latest L.A. Times columna is about Memo Torres and his “Daily Memo” for L.A. Taco. KEY QUOTE: ““Daily Memo” has become the diary Los Angeles never asked for but which is now indispensable, documenting in real time one of the most terrifying chapters in the region’s history.”

You made it this far down? Gracias! Follow me on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram while you’re down here by clicking on their logos down below. Don’t forget to forward this newsletter to your compadres y comadres! You can’t get me tacos anymore, but you sure as hell can give them — and more — to the O.C. Catholic Worker!