about
Based in Los Angeles, just off the city center, I have two cats and one husband. I’ve been a writer since my second-grade teacher read the class Ray Bradbury’s All Summer in a Day. I met Ray Bradbury four times.
In a former life, I was a photographer (commercial and weddings). I still do it for fun.
I’ve been to Japan, Mainland China, Hong Kong, London, Paris, Germany, Italy, Vancouver, and all over America. I travel, read, write, collect vinyl albums, type on a 1970s Lettera 25 typewriter. I observe the world and wear black. Sometimes I paint. I have Lyme Disease, but it’s only temporary. I’m Mexican and grew up in a neighborhood with drive-by shootings. I saw my first dead body when I was in 5th grade. Maybe 6th. I play the piano, guitar, and ukelele. Not very well. Thanks to an inferior public school system, I didn’t graduate from high school despite having more than enough credits. I think the world is pretty fucked up, but it has a lot of redeeming qualities… like The Grand Canyon and sunsets. When I was seventeen, I ran away from home and lived in a Motel 6 for a week. I watched TV and ate canned beans.
I have one older sister and two younger brothers. My favorite cemetery is St. Michael’s Catholic Cemetery in Hong Kong.
Published Work:
- Short Story – SKIPPING STONES – Sheriff Nottingham SN11: Collect Rocks
Not a lot of my old writing is still online. Here’s what I could find.
- Online Marketing for Photographers: The Lessons I Paid For 2012.
- A review of Neurotically Yours (comic book) 2003 (as Mistress Cinka)
- That time my (ex) boyfriend and I interviewed Steve Severin from Siouxsie and The Banshees for Dark Culture Magazine. (as Cinka) May 2000.
- Never to Meat Again – an article on vegetarianism for Morbid Outlook. May 2006. (as Mistress Cinka)
Other Old Stuff:
- Quoted and written about in The goth Bible: A Compendium for the Darkly Inclined
(as Mistress Cinka) 2004.
- My photo of our old house in the Los Angeles Times. In the print version, the credit was given to someone else. Lame. June 2010.
- Several of my polaroids were included in a community art project called Instant Gratification: PolaroidPartyLA as well as in the book that followed: Still Developing: A Story of Instant Gratification
January 2011.