Gonna buy five copies for my mother...

It started out as a piece for Hispanic Heritage Month.

The OC Register asked me to write something about my family leaving Cuba. They were looking to feature Cuban-Americans, they told me.

I had procrastinated on this, so I barely made their deadline. I cobbled together pieces of things that I had already written here on my blog and pieced together a semi-coherent story and hoped for the best.

They liked the piece.

No, wait. They loved it.

In fact, they sent out their photographer to do a photo shoot of me and my family. (Thanks again, Leonard. It was great fun!)

But then today...

The story appeared on the front page of the Register. The FRONT PAGE, people! (Just below the photo of the winning Angels, but that's not important right now.)

And then my neighbor came over to tell me they had mentioned the story on one of our local radio stations. (I know! Shut up!)

The story is posted over at Babalú today, too.

Here's the article in its entirety. Be sure to click over and look at the slideshow where it says "more photos."

It's kind of disconcerting to open the newspaper and find our own old family photos splashed all over.

 

Even better than all of that?

The byline. =D

"SHE EMBRACES U.S., TREASURES CUBA." ~ BY MARTA DARBY. 

("Yes," she says, with feigned modesty and a face-splitting-ear-to-ear grin, "that's me.")

Savoring these 15 minutes of mine...

"Rolling Stone OC Register
Wanna see my picture on the cover
Rolling Stone OC Register
Gonna buy five copies for my mother 
Rolling Stone OC Register
Wanna see my smilin' face

On the cover of the Rolling Stone OC Register."

UPDATED 10/13/2009 - I am just floored by the awesome response to the article! Thanks, everyone! I will try to answer all your emails this week. *her face splits into enormously proud ear-t0-ear grin.* Wow. Just wow. =D)