Meztiza Rhetoric

The inspirational quote that appears daily in my google home space today read, "You are the sum of the five people you spend the majority of time with." If the sum of my being includes part of Anita August, author of Gut Bucket Blues, then my personage is blessed and augmented by her contribution। Anita came back to El Paso, Tx। this week from Washington, D।C। to promote her book giving interviews at KTEP with jazz expert Denis Woo (pictured above in sound room), and then presenting her book last night at a reading coupled with live jazz (book cover and program above)। I sat in on the interview she had with Denis, and her true spirit emerged। She talked about jazz music, art and her years at Cal State Art where she started the book. Unfortunately, Denis didn't read the book because it was sold out at the Barnes and Noble on the Eastside of town here, but he grasped the rythm and color of the book without reading a word.

In the interview, Anita spoke of where she gathered the inspiration for telling a story, and it wasn't from a grandmother or mother who told her stories of their past, but from the Bible. Growing up in a Christian household, she only had the Bible to read many times, and so she thumbed through its delicate pages. The story she recounts is the story of the the adulterous woman who was thrown in Jesus's path by men of religious standing. Jesus did not look up from the circle he was drawing in the sand, and asked the men that if they are without sin then they may cast the first stone. None could. And then Jesus said to her, "Neither do I condemn thee; go and sin no more" (John 8:11). Her inspiration, Anita mentioned, came from stories of people who are not perfect, who are flawed, who are freaks. Those characters attract this author because just below the surface, we are all flawed creatures, at times even freaks to those who know us, and to ourselves.

Anita's reading at the Union last night danced. Accompanied by the sweet jazz of Marty Olivas '91 and QBIZM, the guitar of Rembrant Aaron came to life on cue. Her voice at times was drowned by the music, but that made the audience listen even more closely. People were on the edge of their seats. She read... "When Rebrandt finish beating on his guitar he twist half way on the sweet potato basket and signify with 'em vultures eyes to Diamond Dick and Fingers like he ready to pick some bones clean, "Let's get this funk flying in here.

"That's all Diamond Dick and Fingers was waiting on - The Call. Before Rembrandt twist back 'round to the audience, Fingers done already lower the tone with his harmonica. The sad moaning of it pull you from the Butt-Hutt and drop you smack in the middle of the cotton field. An dyou cain't help but see some old niggah pulling a cotton sack down a row of Delta Pine with a busted back, bleeding fingers, and a demon sun standing watch over him" (43-44).

Last night her friends, profressors, and literary buffs celebrated Anita and her very important accomplishment. Her reading flowed like the blues singin' of her inspiration, Bessie Smith. If you like the music of Bessie, buy the book and you'll be treated to language that sings, purrs, moans, and shrieks all at once.