Welcome to RTG, please introduce yourself.

Hi, my name is Ruthy, and I’m from Houston. My team name is Space City Kitties, but we really use two names because we speak Spanish. So it’d be Gatitas in Spanish in some places, but in English, it’d be Space City Kitties. And then, since I also do co-ed, you can use Space City just in general. Everything has Space City in it.

When did basketball first become part of your life?

I don’t even know. It was crazy because I didn’t even know when I was a kid growing up, [that] my grandpa played basketball. And he played at Blinn College back when it was a college. And then he met my grandma there. I actually went to a basketball camp there in Brenham when I was a kid, in, like, 2004. I never played basketball or sports, or signed up for little leagues or anything, but when I tried out for basketball, I was excited, but I sucked, so I didn’t make the team. And then, it’s like somebody… got hurt or something and then I made a team, but by default. And then, I guess at that point… my grandpa started showing me these drills. The very first drill I learned was the Mikan drill or something like that. That’s the one where you stand under the rim and you do the layups and stuff. My shot was always just, like, a baseline shot. It’s weird because I went to a really small private school in Houston. Maybe there’s 80 kids in the whole school, right? So I was on varsity by seventh grade just because the school was so small, you know? I stopped playing after high school for a long time. But now I’m back.

What brought you back?

Well, the reason why I stopped, or just never tried again, was because my senior year, I had to get open-heart surgery. And the point that I got it was at Christmas time, so by the time [I] would’ve recovered from it, basketball season would’ve been over. So, you know, I didn’t get to play that year. [My] parents would be like, “Oh my God, no,” but really there was nothing wrong with me. I just never tried to play. I wanna say that was the last time I played before [returning to basketball]. In 2008, I think.

After that, I see my friend from high school. She was on my team, and she was posting in 2021 or something like that. I kept asking her and asking her and asking her [to come play at her gym]. And then finally, she let me come one day. She doesn’t even play there anymore, but I just stayed there. And then eventually I brought my sister, and we’ve been to a bunch of different places since 2021. It’s weird because I should have never stopped playing, because whenever I found people that I would go do basketball runs with, they’ve been playing together for, like, 20 years, and they’re grownups. I didn’t realize that adults played basketball like that when I was in my 20s. ’Cause if I would’ve known that, I would’ve been playing. It was kinda like I stopped playing in my 20s and then just picked it back up when I was, like, 33 or something like that. So I played for a long time — I don’t wanna say it took a year for me to… shake the rest off or whatever, but it was outdoors at first. Outdoors is rough. So I’m finally indoors now, and it’s still hot, you know, but it’s not like being outside.

Do you think you appreciate the game differently now than when you were a teenager?

Yeah, because there was one point where I wanted to win trophies. When I had gotten back into it, I wanna say around 2023, and I was doing drills and stuff. Even though it was just, like, for 30 minutes, I would tell myself “damn, if I wouldn't have done that shit in high school,” I would’ve been cold, you know what I mean? But, you know, you just aren’t. You just don’t realize how you could have done more stuff in your youth. I’m not saying I’m old, but,  you know, I could have been playing this whole time. I could have shook the dust off, because even though I didn’t play basketball, I still worked out and stuff. I never stopped doing activities, but I just didn’t know that people played basketball like that, you know? I think when my friend invited me, I was so trashed and I was practicing at my Y. I realized, “Oh, there’s a bunch of old dudes here playing.” So at first, they wanna play, then after that, they let me play, and then I played there for, I wanna say three or four years, until just last year. I was playing at Trotter with them. And those guys have been playing together since I was two, and I’m 37… There’s a guy that plays there, he’s 70. So, I don’t ever wanna stop playing if I don’t have to, you know what I mean? And then you see videos of people overseas. There’s old ladies playing, like, 80 years old. I don’t know if you’ve seen those videos, but there’s a lady that plays for El Salvador. She was 53. She was, like, the oldest person to play.

I think if you keep the movement up as you get [older], then I will maybe not have to stop playing. It’s like when you get stagnant, it takes all that time to get it back, you know? I have two kids. When I had my kids, I never played basketball, but I did work out and stuff. So I take them with me, but they don’t even like basketball. So it’s like, “dang."

So tell me about the Space City Kitties. How did that team come together?

So originally, I played for this team called Guerrero, which was the first outdoor league that I played at, and some of the people that were there stayed. We stayed together. There’s still one girl that we play together [with] from over there. Her name’s Monica. She’s our post. And she’s, like… six foot. She still plays. She lives really far, so we don’t get to see her all the time. But… that’s the original part of how that team started. Mo was there first before me, actually. She’s always been the post. My friend, Melinda, brought me in from high school, and then she kinda left because she got married and engaged, all that stuff… and then I stayed. And then there was a period where nobody would show up. I didn’t have many people to play, then I brought my sister, and now she has her friend. So [that’s] kinda like how the Space City Kitties happened. To condense it, the last league we played at was another outdoor league, but we didn’t have our own team. We’ve never had our own team. This is the first place that we’ve had our own team. We used to play in this other league outside that was called Puebla, and we used to play on a team called Esteyas, and then something happened with Esteas. Somebody didn’t get along, so then they broke up, and I was like, “Mm, I don’t wanna play. I didn’t wanna make a team.” My sister’s idea was to make the team. She’s actually the captain of the team Friday night. Saturdays is me because that’s my league, Space City, and then Thursday I just pick up on somebody else’s team, they’re the captain because I used to be kind of fiery back before. I’ve calmed down a lot. But I couldn’t do it because I would get too rattled. So, whenever we did make our team, I told my sister and Mo that they had to be the captain. So now, if you think about it, us three have been playing together since, like, 2023. My sister, me, and Mo. The first time I ever played with Mo was 2022, ‘21, something like that, right about during COVID. My sister would watch me play and, and I’d be like, “Come play.” She’s like, “Nah, I’m good.” But now she’s the captain of the team. So now she has her coworker that played college ball, so she’s part of the team. She’s really good. Sam, her and Samantha. She comes with me on Saturdays to my co-ed league, so it’s kind of fun, you know? It’s like a small little team, but this last season, we had a really hard time with players coming to the games. It was a really flaky season because we left the Puebla League because everybody wanted to leave because they said it was too easy. I was just like, “Okay.” And then on top of that, we weren’t getting calls and stuff, and they were never accommodating us when we needed stuff. So everybody kind of felt some type of way.

So we all collectively decided to move to this other one where we play now. And we’ve gotten kicked out of there before over some stupid stuff, but we came back and we told them we were gonna make our own team. But, we had two of our teammates that were the starters leave after two games back to our old league. That was the first hit of the season, you know? And after that, I think somebody got sick, and then me and my sister had to go too. So, this season was trash. The last season, we got second [or] third somewhere. We’re still trying to find players. I feel like that’s why we’re not doing anything right now, at least on the Friday night. Sam plays on Sundays. She just won a championship last weekend, so she’s there. She’s always winning. So, we have had our periods, and I could send you guys pictures of how we used to win so much when we were on this lady’s team called Estrellas. We weren’t even our own team yet. And actually, one of our friends is pregnant from that team. So, it’s kinda like a community. If you came and checked it, I’d be like, “Oh, this is kinda cool,” because it’s like a whole family vibe, you know? Because I’ve been doing so much stuff this year, I just decided to do Space City for everything. If you look at my logo on Maya, it has a little space in the background with the astronaut. I was just like, “I’m not just gonna mess with it. I’m just gonna go with Space City Kitties, Space City, and Gatitas, that’s it.” I guess if you think about it, I have all the creative branding all over the Gatitas because I made the jerseys [and] all that stuff that I put the name in. I still do the jerseys and stuff like that, but I’ve kinda taken more of a step back in a way this year, just because I’ve been doing so much community stuff. And it’s hard because you wanna be there, but then it’s also like, “Damn, I gotta go do this.” So who knows how that’s gonna go?

Can you talk about the community work that you’re doing?

I can, yeah, if you want me to. Sometimes it encounters a lot of backlash and hate. So, I always try to warn people beforehand, like, “Oh, I’m sorry if I make you uncomfortable.” And that sucks that I have to say sorry, but that’s how it is right now here, at least in Houston or whatever. So I volunteer for a human rights organization called Field, and they’re an immigration rights organization. They’re from Mexico, but they originated in Houston from U of H. So they kinda started out more school advocacy, but then over the years, it’s more like civil rights now. It’s kinda been like that since last year when there was a kid that got detained for, like, 50 days. I don’t know if you guys remember that. I had already kinda followed them on Instagram and stuff, because I have a mixed status family, like, some of my family are citizens, some of my family were naturalized that became citizens after. Some of my family still might not have. Who knows? I think my stepmom has her green card. I don’t know. But there’s definitely people in my family that would be at risk. So, when I saw that started happening, I was like, “Nah, I’m gonna get out there.” So then the first thing I did was the No Kings protest, and I was super scared because they make it seem like you’re gonna get run over and get a smoke bomb thrown at you, all this kind of stuff. But honestly the very first time I went, I was like, “Damn, look at all these young people.” Another thing that I should have been doing was reading what was going on. You know, I should’ve been just more aware. I feel like people in their 20s and stuff now are more aware of what’s going on in the political climate and stuff, and they’re paying attention and they care more versus [how] we were [partying]. I feel like they still do that, but they care too. They just have a social justice that honestly is motivating for me. And a lot of them are teachers and nurses and stuff, and that’s why they do it, because they’re empathetic people, right? So, at first, I had been asked to volunteer with other people, but I was kinda like, “Ah, no,” [but] whenever they offered me a chance to translate for the kid who had been detained for 50 days, I was like, “Hell yeah.” So that’s kinda where it started for me, because I did his autism evaluation translation, because this mayor of Houston thought that he doesn’t have autism. So they, as an organization, wanted to get him tested and confirm because obviously his mom couldn’t afford it, because she’s not from here. So, I did that. And then after that, I was kinda like, “I don’t wanna go anywhere.” So I just kinda stuck around, and I helped where I could. It started off with me doing tabling events, passing out stuff, like, resources, and then I don’t know how it spiraled because the next thing I did was translate for somebody that couldn’t speak Spanish that was gonna go visit somebody in detention. So, I was kinda like, “I don’t wanna be rude and say no,” you know what I mean? So I did it. And then from there, I made a friendship, not only with the person that I translated with, because I still talk to them today and help them out with their math nonprofit they’re trying to do. At the beginning of the year, I thought it was just gonna be something small. I have met and translated for people in detention, and after that, I was just like, “Damn now I really can’t just sit at home.” ‘Cause it’s kinda like you can’t really. Well, me as a person. When I get old and my kids are grown up, I want them to be like, “What happened? What were you doing? Were you just chilling at home?” Anyway, I just got too motivated, and I started this vendor sponsorship with a girl that has a farmer’s market. So I sometimes will take people that are immigrant vendors that can’t make money right now, and then we’ll go sit down and try to sell their stuff. I asked the girl, because I was like, “It doesn’t hurt to ask, you know, just do it.” So then she said, “Yeah.” So it went from once a month, to now we’re doing it twice a month, and I’m taking vendors, which is cool. The other day on Sunday, some of the people that were at a vigil that we were at saw a volunteer shirt that I had, and they were like, “Oh, I want a ton of those.” I didn’t think they were gonna come to the place and get them, but they did. And all that goes back to them, but I don’t know, it’s just weird. And I think, honestly, the biggest reason why I started doing more in the community is because it has affected my inner circle, my coworkers. There’s coworkers that self-deported before shit got bad. They were kind of smart in a way to do that, you know? They kinda were like, “Nah, I’m gonna go home. My family’s over there waiting for me. I think it’s time.” So, a lot of them did that, and it was really smart because they were, like, in their 40s already. Then there was, some of my friends that had gone to Mexico for Christmas and couldn’t come back. And that’s just another example of how it affects you. That’s just work, right? Then basketball. That’s why I started doing basketball fundraisers, because the first basketball fundraiser that I did was for somebody that was in detention that I didn’t even really know, but they were in a league that I played in. I was just like, “What the fuck?” I didn’t know what to do other than just try to hold a tournament, you know what I mean? The first thing I did was a Christmas tournament, and then I gave away gifts, snack bags. We didn’t raise much, because unless you are doing some crazy rich person fundraising, good luck paying for that shit with $500. Just to secure a lawyer is, like, 7K, just for one person. And if that’s just for the retainer, you know what I’m saying? So, it’s a lot of shit that people don’t realize. That’s why I would feel bad going home and sleeping at night and not being like, “Damn, I wonder what happens to that person.” Because I did keep track. And then it got to the point where every day, the universe tells me, “You’re supposed to be right here.” I haven’t had a job in over a year, but I’ve been just outside trying to help people, and fundraise, and do shit. And that sounds lame, but it takes up a lot of time. It takes up a lot of time to do flyers, all that stuff. Plus, I’m a student. I saw someone getting detained down the street from my mom’s house where I grew up, like, January 3rd. And I had already been dealing with this or seeing it happening since, like, October, because it started happening more in October, but nobody would see it, and everybody was like, “Oh, that’s not real. That’s just not happening,” but it was. So, I’m driving, and I see these people’s cars in the middle of the road, and it’s just a commotion. So then I’m like, “Fucking what? This is crazy. I have to get out.” And the people’s car was left in the parking lot, so I posted it online. Literally, I could walk there from my mom’s house.  And within an hour, [I found out it was] somebody that plays basketball with me’s mom and dad that they had taken. Everything that you hear, like, “Oh, they weren’t the target.” That’s all real, because you know what? They were just waiting for some dude to come out of his apartment to give them a ride to work. They weren’t even supposed to be there. And I think that’s why, for me, it’s like, the universe. I didn’t even [know them]. And then when I found out who it was, I didn’t like the guy. I was like, “Oh, that guy’s a fucking asshole,” but I wasn’t gonna leave his mom and dad hanging. Like, not even try to see what’s up with them. So that couple was, I guess, in a way, how I taught myself how to look up people, like, with these files. Because it’s a bunch of shit, and if you don’t speak English, you’re definitely not gonna figure it out. I speak the language I’m reading, and I’m still trying to figure it out. So if they have the language barrier, I’m like, “how do they even understand?” A lot of the things, like what time you can go visit somebody [and] what it costs to [get a lawyer]. All that stuff is stuff that I learned just from dealing with that one couple. I had figured out that when you put in their number, it’ll tell you which place they’re at, because each place has a different ruling. This sounds so stupid and crazy, but this is why I’m here right now doing this shit. This lady… didn’t have glasses or something like that. She had been there for two weeks. It was just, it’s just wild to me how it was like a sixty-year-old grandma and she didn’t even know where her husband was. He was in a whole nother detention center. He was in Conroe because that’s where they put all the men here. I wanna say they moved her to New Mexico, like, a month later. Then after that, she was back in Venezuela. I wanna say within not even two months, she was gone. You know why? Because she didn’t have money. So that’s the problem. ‘Cause if you don’t have money, you’re done. And she didn’t know what she was signing. So she just signed it because she was over it. And she’s a grandma, you know what I’m saying? But it’s sad, because you raise $500 for the tournament. That don’t matter because it’s 14K just to get it started. So, really, you’re just raising money for the family to pay for a couple things while they’re going through that shit. I was just reading a story tonight about how they're selling plates because somebody’s husband got detained. It’s creepy and weird because ever since a man got shot last month, they’ve been ramping it up too. So you’ve been seeing a lot more detentions and stuff. It sounds really crazy, but it’s real. And to the point where I don’t like to talk in public at all. Like, I’ve been a real behind the scenes person, helping with just buying people groceries, giving people rides, translating, stuff like that. But then, when Lorenzo got shot last month, I was like, “Fuck that. I’m gonna go talk to the mayor. Fuck it. I don’t care.” Somebody had asked, and it was so random because it was on my birthday. It was the 21st of July. And they were like, “Who wants to go?” But I didn’t get to go because I was sick. So then when they said it again on the 26th, I think, I signed up right away. And I just felt like [the mayor] needed to hear it, but really, they just dismiss you. And I did it yesterday again, but he only gave me one minute, and then he’s dinging a bell for me to go. I definitely was able to say more things the second time. But, it just sucks because when you’re telling them what’s going on, like that they’re not getting their medicine, that they don’t have their glasses, that they’re making them sign deportation orders when they don’t even have their prescription glasses. I had to sneak this lady some glasses. I didn’t wear glasses. I went in there with the lastes and I just gave them to her. Another person that I was translating for, she gave me these [bracelets] to give to her husband, which I still have because I don’t even talk to them anymore. It’s just like I can’t turn a blind eye anymore. So, I’ve been saving all of this information. I’ve been doing this since last year, but I’ve been barely talking about it in public. Because I mean, even right now, I have a neighbor in front of me that’s trying to get me kicked out of here for having a sign on my window that says “ice melts,” literally. And now he has a friend that’s doing it too, so now it’s two of them. And then they’re taking pictures of my car. That’s the kind of stuff that people like Whitmire don’t think about when they’re letting people continue to stir the pot. That’s why I told him yesterday, “I saw you on CNN on July 15th, and you look like you didn’t want them here. So, what’s up? Are you gonna tell them to go? ‘Cause they’re right here.”

It’s a ripple effect. You hear the sadness in the family’s voice. They’re crying of despair, depression. They don’t know what to do. Some of these people are sick when their family’s getting locked up, so they’re even more depressed. It’s just a whole wave of sadness, I guess. And so, that’s what I tell my friend all the time. If we could just make them feel a little bit better with basketball, you know, raise some money, have a party for them, make them some gifts for Christmas, even just make them feel like somebody got their back. I can’t tell you how many times since I started going to the city in the past three weeks that people are coming up to be like, “Ah, thank you so much.” They can’t speak, so they’re like, “Thank you.” But that shit’s scary to me every time I go up there, like, my chest is all tight. ‘Cause you’re not only talking to [the mayor], you’re talking to eight other people. It’s a lot of people. And these are people you see on the TV all the time. You’re just like, “I probably sound so stupid right now.” You know, I don’t know if it’s working. I don’t know what’s happening, but we’ve been doing a lot of pop-up, peaceful stuff. Some of my stuff you’ll be able to see, it’s everywhere. But I’ve been accidentally in the front now, so it’s like I don’t even care anymore if I’m behind the scenes or not. Now it’s kinda spiraled into the event thing because I just had an art build for Lorenzo last week, and I had, like, 20 people, and I thought it was gonna be, like, two people. So now they’re like, “Oh, when are we gonna do it again?” So I’m like, “Hey, maybe I gotta do art and sports, because people are asking for art.” So I don’t know. It’s crazy. But it’s a lot of pain and a lot of heaviness that I carry every day. And if I talk about it, it’s hard not to get choked up about it. And when you’re sitting in the city council, about to go talk to them, same thing, like you’re trying not to cry. That’s why your chest feels like that, you know what I mean?

Sure.

And my mom’s an immigrant, my mom’s from El Salvador. The only difference between me and all these other kids is that my dad’s white. So why do [I] care so much? ‘Cause I'm a half-birthright citizen. If my dad wasn’t white, then I’d fucking be at risk for the shit. So a lot has changed. Like I’ve been focusing more on trying to help people this year, and my basketball has definitely suffered. I’ve lost weight, my game isn’t that great. I’m still playing, but I need to sub. My mindset is not [focused on] basketball, or basketball like it used to be. It’s still basketball, but it’s like how can I use basketball to make people feel better? Because in a weird way, basketball is how I’ve gotten the most donations because people just pull up with all the stuff. And that that’s [not including] what we already have. So now it’s gotten to the point we’re gonna give it to the teachers that need it because we have enough for the kids already, and I’ve never done that before. Again, it’s so much stuff that’s happening so quickly in like one month. I’m gonna have a backpack drive with them on Saturday. We’re gonna get the stuff out. Recording stuff, I was more behind the scenes, but now I’m… learning how to talk more out loud, I guess you could say. It’s hard., especially when… I’ve been called some crazy ass stuff just by this person in front of me. Or, “go back to your country.” I’m like, “I was all born here. Like, what?” Or they’ll be like, “Oh, you don’t belong enough to be born here.” And these are people that I went to high school with.  I can’t tell you how many people I have cut off this year. It sucks. But again, that’s why I’m trying to build a basketball community. It kinda gave me an idea from that documentary that’s on Netflix where [this guy] made a soccer community in Brazil. He helped all these kids get out and be [a] family, to play soccer and stuff. It was also like, if they needed something, they could go there, eat. If they wanted to come chill, it was fine, stuff like that. We need that right now because there’s lots of people that are losing people left and right. Like, some of [these kids] don’t have parents. Some of them are gonna lose a parent. Then lastly, my own family. My own family is going through that right now. Like, my dad that I don’t talk to, and it just sounds crazy. I don’t talk to my dad or any of them… because they’re MAGA. Super MAGA. So they were trying to brainwash me, and the guy that they go to church with was trying to make me vote. It was cool, like whatever you wanna do, but, don’t try to brainwash me, you know what I’m saying? I haven’t talked to them in a year, but now they want my help because his girlfriend, who’s from Cuba, that’s about to have his baby, her kid is about to get deported. So now, it’s my own family circle, and I don’t really talk to them. I don’t. At first, when they said, “Oh my God, my mom’s gonna have to tell you something.” I was like, “I don’t care to hear anything about him. Don’t talk to me about him. Like, I don’t talk to him at all.” But then when she told me that it had to do with the kid, and I started to hear the details, it made a lot of sense. At first, I didn’t believe. I was like, “Let me hear the story.” It made a lot of sense because it was at the same time that all these states [lost their funding] just a couple weeks ago. So when I’m saying [that it] is that deep for me, [it’s] because it is. It’s just a lot of crap. It’s hard to concentrate on basketball and be good at basketball, but I can’t be like, “I’m done. Sorry. Not coming back,” you know? Because the guy who founded it was like, “I hope, you know, that wasn’t your last time going to city hall.” And I was like, “No, it’s not.” They’re gonna have their first ever ICE transparency hearing next week, and I already signed up for that. As soon as it came out, I signed up for it, because I have a lot of my own statistics that I give them that are not made up. I’m not trying to be a fear monger. I’m not trying to be a crazy person. These are just things that I have observed just in the last year, just from a couple of families. It’s hard for me to know if [city council] cares, because they have the poker face, you know what I mean? It’s weird. It’s weird. Maybe they do care when they go home. I don’t know, but I can’t tell.  It’s kind of discouraging when you walk up, you’re like, “Did they hear me?” I told [the mayor] that all these kids are scared to go to school. I mean, not that all the kids, but some of them. I can’t tell you how many kids and players, or even  grownups too, are getting bullied by someone, “Oh, I’m gonna isolate you.” Like, you know, it’s just terrible. I mean, like I told him, “You could have done something. You could have put some policy [in place].” The only person that I know to get out of detention was a lady that I translated for, and she’s from Colombia. And she had been there since September 2025, I think, and she just got out  in June. We got to go pick her up, so I’ve only known one person to leave there. And she has an ankle monitor now. So, it’s not like they really let you out because I think the next morning they put an ankle monitor on you. But again, it’s not stuff that I scream from the top of the rooftop, because at the beginning, when it was all happening, I would, and nobody would believe me. But now you see her reposting [posts about what’s happening] and you’re just like, “I’ve been telling y’all. I’ve been trying to tell y’all that they’ve been here.” It’s crazy because it always happens super early in the morning, so people can’t really see it. I shared with the mayor the statistic that Houston had the highest ICE arrests last year. It was, like, 50% or something like that. More than any other state and more than any other big city. You can look it up. I looked it up. It was a study by U of H. I told the mayor, “even your own school, U of H. So, I’m not saying stop doing what you gotta do, but, like, are there some rules somewhere?” Now, I went to go buy the balloons for the person that got shot…I haven’t met his son, but his son reached out and told us thank you for hosting that for his dad. It’s such beautiful art. And that for me is like, “Damn, I don’t wanna quit now.” So, that’s why I’m trying to see how it goes with Miya, so somehow we can continue to help people through basketball. And it’s sad, and I don’t think it’s gonna get fixed anytime soon. I haven’t been to go visit somebody in detention in a minute, but that shit’s sad. Especially when there’s people there and they bring their kids, because they have to leave their kid. Sometimes a kid will cry, but, like, the lady that I knew that was in there for 10 months, she told her kid she was at college. She didn’t even tell them where she was. They put an ankle monitor on [her husband] too. I feel like it’s kinda like, I don’t wanna say intimidation, but [they] make it difficult if you wanna go home, I guess. Again, look how tired I look just dealing with it all the time. I think every time I go to city hall, it drains me. I’m still tired from yesterday. That was at, like, 2:00 PM, and then I had to do all the back to school stuff today. So, you know, you’re trying to do back to school, except for the kids you don’t know too. It’s a lot, but I don’t wanna stop. I’m just trying to figure out how to weigh all of it, how to do basketball. I wanna keep playing, and then still maybe have teams for kids, but that just entails so much, you know? It’s easier with adults. People will be asking me for cards now too, [with] lawyer’s numbers and stuff. That’s fine. I don’t care. That’s how I am with basketball leagues. If I’m there to play for my little 10 minutes, when I’m on the bench, that’s what I’m there for, because now people come up and ask me for that. Like, “Hey, do you know this?” Or, “Hey, can you give me this phone number?” So, I’m not trying to say I wanna run for Congress or whatever, but I wouldn’t mind trying to build a little program or something somewhere. Kind of how other people have around, but more just strictly sports or art. I wanna do both, but I don’t know. We’ll see. I love basketball. I don’t wanna stop playing. It all ties in somehow because people that would play basketball don’t even go play no more because they’re like, “Damn, what happens if I’m, like, driving home?” It just sucks. You continue to suffer tragedy on top of the immigration thing that’s happening. Like, on the other basketball league… a guy killed his ex-girlfriend and the brother. They were people that have played in the league before, like, their mom [has] or something. So, they were having fundraisers for them for the past two weeks on top of all the stuff that’s going on. But I’m happy to get to play basketball and raise money at the same time, though.

Well, that’s incredible. First of all, I think you’re a hero.

It’s hard, bro. People hate me so much.

But you’re fighting for your community. And I think we need to be sensitive and thoughtful with this story.

Definitely. I’m not trying to say to keep it private. I don’t mind that at all. But, I don’t want y’all to get hurt, get yelled at, insulted, or anything like that. I don’t care about me. And that’s why I always warn people, because I had a girl up at the farmer’s market the other day, she wanted to make a post about it, and I was like, “Are you sure? ‘Cause, I mean, you have this farmer’s market, you might lose some followers when they see you [what] you stand with.” When I started to host art nights in my apartment complex, people were calling to cancel it because they said, “How dare they support that nonprofit?” And it’s just like, “Bro, it’s art night for kids. Like, what?” Just from the very beginning, it’s a lot of backlash. So, I just wanted you to know what came with it when I started to talk about it, you know what I’m saying?

I just want to make sure we tell the correct story... I think this is too important.

I’m gonna be in somebody’s documentary, too. I don’t even know when it’s coming out. But one of my friends, I met him through Fiad, he’s doing a little short film. And his name is Brandon Carafella. He does film [and] art stuff, like, in the cinema [in Houston]. I ran into him the other day at the protest. I was like, “Bro, I haven’t seen you.” And so, now he wants to catch up, and then he heard about the art night. He heard about the zine. So now he wants to collab, which sounds really cool to do, like a community zine. And that sounds really badass. I’m down to do that. And that’s a way to keep it. I feel like people can tell their story, but we can also do a trigger warning. He also wants to try to submit it to the zine fest in, by the 13th, like a sample of it. I hope people actually wanna sign up and fill it out. I don’t know how we’re gonna do that either, but we’re gonna try to put it in a place where people would be like, “Oh, yeah, I’d write a couple words, and put them in there.” And then [they] can either put if they’re gonna be anonymous or not. And it doesn’t even have to be words. It could be a little doodle. It could be a collage, because I’ve been doing that a lot lately. I had just recently switched from interior design to leadership and stuff, so I could do sociology and shit. Maybe [I’ll do] something with [that] eventually, since I’m an intern now. I’m doing all this whole, like, unlocking my inner person, you know? So, I’m working on a Latina Power [zine] right now. I don’t really know if I’m a real zine person. What if it looks too pre-K or something when [I] submit it? But you never know until you know. So, me and Brandon are gonna try to do that around Diados Muertos. It’ll be kinda like… remembering the people that are not here. They might not be dead, but they’re not here anymore, so it sucks.

Well,  I’ve got an incredible story from you. I’m super excited about it. I think it’s super powerful and it needs to get out there. So, thank you so much.

I always knew that shit was happening, you know? But then when you see it happening to people where you hoop at. It just looks different here. It’s not as lively as it was. When you see it happening where you play basketball, it’s like, not here, too.