Canto: CCCLXX: The Feast of the Seven Drafts

Gentle cabrones:

This one’s gonna be short, because my 2024 ended with me fighting the flu, and my 2025 began with me, my honey, and our friends waiting in the pedestrian line at the U.S.-Mexico border for three hours in foggy, bone-chilling weather only to have la migra be assholes at the end, as they are wont to do.

I’ve got a lot of catching up to do, and one of them is pitching a chingo of ideas to my editor. She’s really cool – fun to hang with, hammers my word swarf into swords. Respected the hell out of her when she was a reporter, was proud when she became an editor, and was happy when she became my editor.

But that doesn’t mean we always agree — because where would be the fun in THAT.

Early on in our time working together, I turned in a columna that she said was good. I said that wasn’t good enough; it needed to be GREAT – caps in the original. She replied by saying that not all of them could be great. And my response was something to the extent of “Like hell they can’t.”

I then explained my philosophy of journalism, which is a mix of baseball and basketball. As writers, all of us need to get on base with the frequency of a great free throw shooter. We can’t afford to hit .300; we’ve got to aim for like the high-80 percentile. Unsustainable and impossible?

Like hell it ain’t.

As a columnist, the stakes are even higher. The minimum hit I can get is a double, one of the great hits in baseball. They show off your power, and you either advance a runner, drive them home, or set yourself up for someone to do the same for you. And really, every columna I do needs to be a home run.

But the only way you can do that is by doing it. And do it. And do it again.

I’m sure she was humored by my sports theory of writing at first. But she now definitely respects it and expects it two years and change later. Why, we were working on my latest columna just yesterday.

“Good column,” she told me via Slack after the first draft.

“Time to make it GREAT,” I replied.

“I knew you’d say that,” she wrote.

And off to the edits we went.

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When I tell my students they should do a minimum of seven drafts on all their papers, most of them get shocked. I tell them you can always improve – and you should always improve.

Whether you whittle (Canto CIII) or talachear (Canto CXIX), you should always give it your best, and always push yourself to go beyond that — but you can only do that by doing it, and doing it, and doing it again. Why wouldn’t you?

Why would you settle for something that you think is innate when you can get something better by WERK (Canto XXV)? Not trying to improve at all times, for projects big and small, is an insult to you, an insult to the people who will be affected by said projects, and to everyone who knows you. Not trying to improve is a terrible example for those who look up to you, for yourself, for humanity.

Am I exaggerating? No.

Aiming for greatness and getting there slowly but surely is how we change the world, Jack. And if you get thrown out at second going for that double? You’ll get it next time by WERKING on your running style — you gotta learn how to run on Roberto Clemente, you know?

So for 2025, don’t do good — do GREAT. And do it. And do it, and do it again, to paraphrase Mavis Staple (who was singing about something COMPLETELY different haha).

Told you this one was short. Better than a Best of canto, you know? Now, to escarvar… 

**

Enough rambling. This was the semana that was:

IMAGE OF THE WEEK: INCREDIBLE tiradito de chuletón — thinly sliced pork chop in the style of the Peruvian version of sashimi — at Hacienda Guadalupe in the Valle de Guadalupe in Baja California, which I visited on Thursday as part of my honey’s quarterly wine tours. Sign up for her newsletter to know when the next one will be!

QUOTE OF THE WEEK: “What's the matter with those characters in Ohio? I'll bet there are some far-out dudes that you grew up with back in Ohio." — A janitor to Jonathan Winters early in his career

LISTENING: “Hawaiian Roller Coaster Ride,” Kamehameha Schools Children's Chorus and Mark Kealiʻi Hoʻomalu. Whenever I get sick, I park myself on our couch and watch film classics I’ve never seen. This time around, I finally got to Lilo & Stitch — hey, I doubt you’ve seen Duck Soup, so spare me. What a magical, quirky movie! The highlight is this sweet, evocative song, which is framed by one of the most beautiful sequences of acceptance and allowance of happiness I’ve ever seen on film. Did you know that “Hawaiian Roller Coaster Ride” wasn’t even nominated for an Academy Award for Best Song, while something from Frida was? “Burn it Blue” —what the hell is THAT?

READING: “Christmas in Maine”: Again, not a fan of Yuletide anything (why the hell should a Mexican like me celebrate with a German tree, Anglo-Saxon holly, and American matching pajamas?), but if you’re going to go for it, this Down East oldie-but-goodie is as evocative of the season as anything I’ve read.

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  

Jan. 4-5 aka THIS WEEKEND: This is really cool: Jouyssance, a choral group committed to singing pre-Baroque pieces (and which my sometimes-jefe, L.A. Times features editor Steve Padilla, is a member), is doing a Christmas program featuring 16th-century Mexican music — and I'm going to be the narrator! Jan. 4 will be at 7:30 p.m. at Holy Nativity Episcopal Church, 6700 W. 83rd Street, Westchester; January 5 will happen at 4 p.m. at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, 122 S. California Ave., Monrovia. Tickets are $25 general admission, $20 for seniors, and $10 for students with ID — buy them TODAY or at the door!

Jan. 12, noon: I will be the grand marshal at the reenactment of the signing of the Articles of Capitulation — the formal agreement that ended the Mexican-American War in California — at the Campo de Cahuenga Historical Site, 3919 Lankershim Blvd. Studio City. What does that mean? I get to give a short speech! Come see this important part of California history for FREE.

Jan. 21: Remember when I used to come out on KPCC’s AirTalk with Larry Mantle every other week to talk Orange County stuff? I do! Well, I’m taking a trip back in time for Larry’s 40th anniversary tour with a taping about OC matters at the Bowers Museum in SanTana! Going to start at 7 p.m, and tickets are FREE, but you gotta RSVP!

Gustavo in the News

“Alta Journal’s Top Newsletters of 2024”: My write-up on the jellied consommé at Musso & Frank gets a shoutout.

“Letters to the Editor: A ‘wokoso’ on the reasons more Latinos voted for Donald Trump”: Los Angeles Times readers discuss a columna of mine.

Gustavo Stories 

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

“L.A. County’s Hall of Administration should stand, Janice Hahn says. And not because of her dad”: My latest L.A. Times columna sees me take a tour of the unloved structure. KEY QUOTE: “Seat of the county of Los Angeles since it opened in 1960, it looks like a Lego block with slits.”

“What I learned from watching Fox News after the New Orleans terrorist attack”: My next latest L.A. Times columna is a critique of the cable news channel. KEY QUOTE: “Given that its ratings are the highest in a decade and that it was the highest-rated cable network for the ninth consecutive year, too many Americans have decided that Fox News’ whine-world is reality and have voted into office fellow true believers.”

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!