Raquel Martina Martinez

Raquel Martina Martinez: To Write, Perchance to Sleep : I’ve blogged nonstop once a week for the last seven years, and in that time, I’ve skipped that many blogs or less because of lack of tim...

I’ve blogged nonstop once a week for the last seven years, and in that time, I’ve skipped that many blogs or less because of lack of time. There are only so many hours in a day and sometimes other things happen. Fellow writers sacrifice sleep, family, and other obligations because their writing commitments take precedence.   I admire them for that, but I can’t. I get physically ill if I don’t get my sleep.   I never fought naptime as a child and have been this way all my life.   I can get by with five or six hours of sleep at night, but only if I get to nap sometime the next day. My optimum writing time is in the early hours – morning through late afternoon, but come evening, my brain is fried and the quality of my writing starts to falter.   When that happens, it is best for me to set the alarm for an early hour and go to bed because nothing much is going to get done when I am physically tired. My family are THE most important people in my life.   Helping them in an emerge

As far back as I can remember, Christmas has been my favorite holiday. As soon as I could write, I’d pen my letter to Santa.   I’d start with all my merits – obedient, kind, star pupil – then, I would hit him with all the things I felt I deserved, my purchase order list of Christmas wants. I’d direct him to the better buys, where he could get my toy at the best price, and if that didn’t work (I knew who the real Santa was), I’d leave catalogs lay about the house, opened to the page and with the item circled in ink pen. Sometimes, I’d sigh loudly and mention that the “Barbie I want is on page 362 of the Sears Catalog.” In the twenty-two years I lived with my parents, I never once got anything I had asked from Santa. I got stupid things like a pink teddy bear (pink?), a neon green outfit that enhanced my sallow skin (and I looked like I had jaundice), and a second-hand boy’s bike my parents found at a garage sale when I turned eighteen (I was past the bike stage and ready for a c

Raquel Martina Martinez: Nothing Stops Me from Celebrating Christmas : One Christmas, my youngest son packed his torn-down Volkswagen into our two-car garage. Its motor took up one-fourth of one parking space,...

One Christmas, my youngest son packed his torn-down Volkswagen into our two-car garage. Its motor took up one-fourth of one parking space, and the body took up the whole other half of the garage. To fit everything into the limited space, he had to push it all up against the storage boxes that lined the front wall. As Christmas neared, I was able to get to the Christmas tree and the Nativity set I always used but not the boxes and boxes of decorations. I complained to both the husband and the son, but neither had the time nor the inclination to move all that metal so I could get to my things. We were going to have Christmas that year with presents around a bare tree, so two days before Christmas, I gave up on them and went in search of more decorations.   Everything was half-priced but it was also picked over. I bought lights and odds and ends, just enough to cover the tree and call it a go. Nothing was going to stop me from celebrating Christmas.               *      *      *

Raquel Martina Martinez: My Thoughts and Prayers : This phrase has come under scrutiny lately, called trite, overused, ineffective, insulting.  Yet, when Hurricane Harvey hit Houston in A...

This phrase has come under scrutiny lately, called trite, overused, ineffective, insulting.  Yet, when Hurricane Harvey hit Houston in August 2017, there was little more most of us could do other than contribute money and goods, and offer our thoughts and prayers. When the lone gunman killed all those innocent people while they attended Sunday services in November 2017, there was little most of us could do other than contribute money and goods, and offer our thoughts and prayers. Very few of us are trained in rescue efforts or how to take down a shooter.   If we tried, we would slow the efforts of those who can, so we help in the best way we can.   We offer our sympathy and our prayers. Instead of on our knees or offering sympathy, those who make fun demand instead that we should be on our feet, marching and demanding change. Their displaced anger blinds them to the fact that as human beings we need emotional and physical support as much as we need food, water, and safety/she