Learn People Better

Aisha Sloan

My third Learn People Better interview appeared in TROP today. I talked with Aisha Sloan about her collection of essays The Fluency of Light. We discussed the lyric essay, her writing process, intuition, her father and race. You can read the interview here.

Here’s an excerpt for you:

Aisha Sloan: I feel like I’m supposed to have a plan, but I also feel like I’ve moved into a place where I really appreciate and accept my intuition and my gut. It doesn’t always tell me what it’s up to, but I know more and more what feels right. I know that I’m supposed to be here right now.

But I just have this feeling that’s insufficient explanation.

Zoe Ruiz: Well, I think a lot of people answer the question in ways that are defined by the external. If you say, I just followed my intuition here, people are going to be like—

AS: You can go now.

Meiko Takechi Arquillos took photos of Aisha Sloan! I love working with Meiko.

Here’s one of them that didn’t appear in Trop.

You can view more photos of Aisha on Meiko’s blog. 

Lalin St. Juste

I’m working on “Learn People Better,” a very long interview project. It’s taking me a long time. I’m working at turtle speed.

One of the most exciting parts of the project is that I’m collaborating with L.A.-based photographer Meiko Takechi Arquillos. I admire her work so much!

Awhile ago, Two Serious Ladies published my first Learn People Better interview and this week, Yay! LA published my second interview.

In this second interview, I talked with my friend Lalin St. Juste about her relationship with music. In the interview, she said:

I’m pursuing this career and allowing a lot of interest to accrue on my debt because I choose to do so. I spend my money on other things, such as the band or voice lessons. I guess my sacrifices are mostly financial. But I also think- I don’t know if this falls under sacrifice- but I may be jeopardizing what people may or may not think of me because I have a graduate degree that I’m not using whatsoever. I don’t know if those are actual sacrifices.

Read the entire interview here.

Also, here’s another beautiful photograph that Meiko took of Lalin that did not appear in the Yay! LA.

Vanessa Caroline

Two Serious Ladies published my first interview from “Learn People Better.” The first interview is with Vanessa Caroline, who told me about her personal experience working as a receptionist at a plastic surgeon’s office.  Please read it here and then read other writing on the site because it’s a great online magazine run by Lauren Spohrer.

Here’s an excerpt

ZR: It would seem to me that there would be a lot of fascinating or peculiar people in that environment in terms of the clientele. Was there a moment when someone was in front of you and you were interacting with them and thought, What is this? Is this really happening?

VC: We did have this one patient. The doctor had to cut her off pretty much. Even though she came in every few days begging him for cheek implants and big lips. It had gotten to the point where she couldn’t move her face. She had so much Botox.

She’d say, “Honey. Just book me for the appointment. Put me in. I’ll pay. Just get me in.” I told her, “Mrs. Jane Doe. You’re beautiful. You really don’t need anything else.”

She said, “No. Look at this. My lips look like they’re going down.” I was thinking, Your lips can’t go down if a nuclear bomb hits them. But she was warped into what she thought she needed to do.

Meiko Takechi Arquillos took photos of Vani. 

The interview project is taking longer than I thought, which isn’t too surprising. I tend to be overly ambitious.

Two people helped proofread this article and I’m really grateful for their time:

Kelly Opdycke is a second year Communications Studies graduate student and COMM 150 teaching associate at California State University, Los Angeles. She is currently working on her master’s thesis, which will examine the ironic rhetorical style of The Daily Show and how this style may be a new, more effective form of journalism. Her research interests include political communication, media, and social change. She will be applying to doctoral programs this fall.

Dale Zapata reads.

the why

This is what I texted my friend in New York:

 I just got this idea…Because this year is going to be a hard one, im going to do a bunch of interviews (one a week) to get out of myself and title the personal project “learn people better.”

Then I taught my Thursday yoga class and had coffee with a friend. While we were having coffee, my friend in New York texted back:

That’s a really good idea.

So I told my friend at coffee, I said, OK. I have this idea. 

He already knows that this year is a hard one. I didn’t have to explain too much about that. But I told him how the night before I was transcribing interviews for a friend and how the next morning, I found Woody Guthrie’s 1942 New Year’s Resolutions and read #15 Learn People Better. Something about this year being hard and transcribing other people’s interviews and Guthrie’s resolutions helped me realized I wanted to do this project because I really want to learn people better and now is the perfect time to do it. I like the idea of spending hours and hours and hours listening to other people and transcribing their words and then publishing them for other people to read. Well, I don’t so much like the idea of doing it. It’s more that I need to do it.

What do you think? I asked my friend.

He really liked the idea, too. Which was a relief. Two friends liked the idea, which basically meant that I was going to do the project. He said he was trying not to get excited because…he gets carried away with friend’s ideas.

I looked at him and said, Oh…You can get excited about it because I’m feeling pretty discouraged. You can give me some of what you have.

So he got excited about it and told me to start a tumblr. Then the next day (today), I did.