As of now, my play is titled I Know This Place. It centers on an encounter between two versions of myself: the child who experienced La Calle, the area downtown wiped out by urban renewal in the late 1960s, and the adult historian who has spent decades trying to understand what happened there.

Moving through memories of neighborhood routines, my mother, racial boundaries, and a queer child's growing awareness of self, the play explores what lived experience can reveal that maps and historical records cannot. Ultimately, neither way of knowing is complete without the other.

Writing I Know This Place was difficult and, at times, emotional. In writing the play, I came to understand more fully the role my mother played in nurturing my relationship with La Calle. I also realized that some of what I later pursued as a historian began on those walks with my mother, as a child watching, listening, and learning how to see.

Try not to miss it! Barrio Stories is scheduled for November 12–15, 2026. It is going to be trippy to see actors bring the child and adult versions of me and the presence of my mother to life onstage.