Your Mother Will Write Books Like That Too

by Janine Santiago

One of the greatest motivations for me as a graduate student was when they brought Dr. Vicki Ruiz to UB. She's at Arizona State and is the leading Chicana historian in the nation. She came here through the Gail Paradise Kelly Memorial Lecture Series.

I have her anthology, Unequal Sisters, a big one! We had a snowstorm when she came, so she was all by herself one day in the hotel, and I said, "I'll take her around." I took her with my daughter, Claudia, and showed her Buffalo.

Through that one day I got so much motivation - not because she's a woman scholar only, but because she's a woman oral historian who has been very successful and who has similar stories to mine, because she has two children also.

The first thing that Claudia told her was, "My mommy showed me the books that you have written, and they're very big! How do you have time to write all those books?"

Vicki answered, "You wake up very early, and you do other stuff, but I have kids like you, and your mother will write books like that too one day." I thought that was such a kindness.