End of an Era

Val and Kendra recording our first ever podcast episode in Kendra's closet.

For myself, All This came about when I was really noticing the structures of oppression that are engrained in our society.

Teaching at a community college, reeling after the election of Donald Trump and my rekindled friendship with Kendra led to All This being created.

It gave us an avenue to explore and educate and put something into the world to help other womxn like us. It was a way to start conversations with family members, friends, and students, and the podcast held us accountable.

More than that, it was a sense of community. Through building All This I learned web design but also that there was a wealth of resources, organizations and activists on the ground, and online, who are putting in the work, who stand with us, who understand us. All this inspired me.

Having a strong advocate like Kdogg, provided me with so much support. We did everything for All This ourselves. Minus the article links, all the photos are from Kendra's camera. The blogs are written by me. We curated each article by reading it and discussing it and then putting it up. We personally reached out to people to have our Let Me See You Segment. Our friend's pets are up on the Cat Videos page. Updating the website, keeping it current, was what we did long distance. We wound up with 28 pages. We designed and commissioned our logo. Artists to Watch was us diligently emailing our Instagram favs and hoping they would respond.

The podcast was a labor of love. Audio editing became a new hobby. Social media was a language that I had to learn to be fluent in. Kendra showed me how to block accounts after white fragility, sexism, or homophobia plagued our mentions. Eventually the line between what I would post on my personal accounts and the All This Insta or FB began to blur and I realized I had become bolder and braver. The interactions I was now having were elevated. I had set boundaries within my life and became more at home in my surroundings. All This was an experience.

Learning to like my voice after it was recorded but mostly how to articulate how I felt about the shit that was (and still is) going on in this world. The names of every black person murdered between 2015-2017 sat with me and worked their way within me until they finally pushed their way onto the page and led to my book Queer AF. All This and Kendrick Lamar gave me the confidence to apply and present at TEDXABQ.

All This changed the way I taught and engaged with students and my own children. It led to me designing and presenting my own equity and inclusion workshops. It gave me an education.

While we no longer have the time to devote to our All This project we both hope that our readers and listeners continue their education. We hope you keep having the conversations that lead to organizing and advocating. NPR, Teen Vogue, my personal Instagram, @authorvaldaysanchez and Pink News will keep you engaged in the fight.

Thank you, for your support through Go Fund Me, that got us started, and for listening to our podcast and visiting our site. Thank you to Kendra, you were the best person to do this with. I value our friendship so much.

Look out for my new podcast, "So What Are You???" which features interviews from a diverse group of people talking about race and identity, premiering this Fall, RIGHT HERE on this blog.