Wendy Angulo Productions
“Being a woman to me translates to my becoming, my being and my owning that I AM FREE! I am free to be who I was born to be. I am free to express myself the way I see me. I am free to define for myself the categories I choose for me. How I identify, serve others, hug often, define myself, whether in jeans or in a dress, the way I speak are completely me! My words, my hair, my art, my stories, my curves, my mind, my voice are only what you see because I am FREE and LOVE being ME!” – Alicia Anabel Santos, Mother, Author, Founder of The New York City Latina Writer’s Group.
I met Alicia on a January morning back in 2012 while I attended my first meeting of the NYCLWG in her apartment.
The moment you meet her she is like a gentle giant (she is tall lol) who welcomes you with a soft voice and a warm hug that only she can give. Once you step into her space you feel safe. That day I was nervous, didn’t know what to expect, the room was filled with a group of women who sat in a circle, journal and pens in hand. My initial idea was just to attend and observe …hmmm was I wrong! Alicia had a different plan, I was there to write and share my story with everyone else in the space, introduce myself and talk about my writing career or why I love to write…womp womp I wanted to get up and excuse myself but I couldn’t. Well that day for four hours we wrote and shared and in the most genuine way my story and my writings were embraced by every woman in the room, especially Alicia who said: “Beautiful! You have a story to tell! Are you ready?” and she followed with an invitation to her upcoming Writing from the Womb Writing Workshop. I signed up thinking to myself “oh man I should have stayed home and kept my writings just for me” but at the same time I felt a rush and the desire to do it and I did. For 6 weeks we met in her apartment every Sunday, writing for four hours! Some Sundays the writing was easy but other times it was difficult to resuscitate some memories and episodes of my life but Alicia was always there to hold me and guide me, to cry with me and cheer me on as well as every woman who was part of the workshop. I finished the workshop with a twenty page Manuscript of my Memoir and a week later Alicia organized a reading to celebrate all the readers.
One of the things I admire about Alicia is her nurturing ways with every person she knows, she listens to your story, she cries with you, she gets angry with you and at the end hugs you and tells you that it’s ok that it will pass and you’ll move on because life does.
Also her ability to help women writers to excavate memories and simply write! The work that she does with the New York City Latina Writer’s Group is amazing and worthy of worldwide recognition. She provides women with a safe space and a supportive group to simply write whether you want to be published or not. She never ever turns anyone away and I want to thank her for giving me and other women the chance to write and giving us a safe space to do so.
31daysofwomen#WAP#powerful#innovators#allthingswomen
