(VOICES Photo/Josh Garcia)

I picked up Hector Mendoza and Lilliana Lopez and we got to Oracle as fast as we could. Hector was running late for his interview, so he got a crash course on photography from Lilliana in the car. We arrived as the sun began to set, and one of the owners of Jax Kitchen met us at the door. His name was Brian Metzger, and he was ready for his interview.

Hector was more excited than nervous. We had spent weeks preparing for this. We practiced listening skills, follow-up questions, getting the answer you want instead of a “yes” or “no” response from your subject. That was how we talked – interviewer and subject. We prepared for the worst, and in the end, Hector felt ready for not just one interview, but two!

Brian led us into the kitchen and introduced us to subject number one, head chef Casey McQueen. Casey answered questions on everything from wine storage to growing up in a household that loved cooking. After interview one wrapped up, Casey prepared a scallops dish for us. Lilliana and Hector devoured it as I stood off to the side, nauseated by the tiny allergens in the scallops, watching them eat.

Brian, subject number two, was up next. Hector, as expected, performed professionally, and as he was cruising through the interview, getting some details about the many elements of fine dining, I realized something. This was not a youth turning into a professional; this was a professional. He was preparing an article for a news service. He was getting paid for his work. Everyone at VOICES did this.

Four days a week, they turned out work. They set up interviews. They wrote and told stories. All I did, all we did, as mentors, was coach them towards excellence. When they give us their final drafts, they are often powerful, heartwarming, or even heartbreaking news pieces.

After I dropped Hector and Lilliana off at VOICES, they told everyone how the interview and photo shoots went. I got back into my car and started it up. Before driving away, I thought of all the journalists out there. Not just the adults, but the ones in high school who were still learning. Didn’t they all have something in common? A drive to be great or to tell a good story? VOICES made me reconsider what a professional was. I knew Hector would write a great article, so I shifted into gear and drove home. It was dark. Tomorrow, we would talk about transcription.

As soon as Hector Mendoza has his piece on fine dining published, we’ll be sure to let you know. Stay tuned! — Joshua Garcia, VOICES’ Writing Mentor

What led you to VOICES? Why are you here?

I came to VOICES because … I’ve seen how writing can transform lives.  When I arrived in Tucson, I was looking for a community literacy organization to support but I wasn’t sure how available I would be.  After visiting, it became clear that VOICES would put to good use any time I could share – and that the staff truly understood how to support young writers.

I’m here because I believe that we all have a psychic need to tell our stories, to have a “voice.”  It seems to me that it’s the youth who, developmentally, are most in need—and most open—to exploring what makes them unique.  Youth are particularly eager to know who they are, where they come from, how they’ve changed, what they love, what they believe, who they want to be, and where they want to go in their futures.  VOICES encourages youth to write about themselves,  and also to write about their communities.  In this sense as well, youth also seem more open to doing rigorous critical inquiry projects.  They get excited about investigating all of those normalized things that maybe shouldn’t be so normal in society.

Recently we saw you eating at Beyond Bread … what were you doing there, and what did you order?

My wife and I were on a date.  Daycare is a beautiful thing.  We hadn’t gone out to lunch, just the two of us, in a very long time.  I think we ordered their special, the salmon salad, and of course, had three cups of coffee.

Rumor has that you are in an MFA program. Which one?

I’m in Antioch’s program—out of Los Angeles.  I chose Antioch for two reasons.  It’s a low-residency model, so I can write from wherever we happen to be.  And it’s also the only MFA program in the country that’s devoted to social justice.  The writers are mature, have a broad vision about what writing can do, and they aren’t constrained by the common delusion that writing should be purely aesthetic.

What’s been your favorite VOICES moment so far?

Day one.  We all sat in a circle and everyone shared a bit about how they do or don’t identify themselves, culturally, ethnically, and why.  Everyone I think shared things about themselves that they hadn’t ever had the chance to articulate before.

If you could collapse your “philosophy of life” into three sentences, what would they be?

Three sentences?  I couldn’t collapse it into three books!  That’s maybe why I’m in an MFA program.  My approach to my “philosophy of life” is probably simple enough. I listen as hard I can.  I try to let in all the beauty and all the horror that I can—so that I’ll never be in denial about our role in enabling both.

You impress us. What impresses you?

Well, I took a drive up the Santa Catalinas a few weeks ago.  That was impressive.  But in terms of people, well, when young people step up and tell their stories.   I think they renew in us our sense that we all can play a role in making our communities and world a better place.

If you could interview one other person at VOICES, who would it be and why?

Any of the photographer volunteers.  I’d love to know what they’ve learned from the youth they work with about what pictures need to be taken—and about their vision in general.

(VOICES Photo/Krista Niles)

Together, SMPC and VOICES will be a new agency with a brand new identity and name. Last night several of us got together on the patio of the Hotel Congress downtown and brainstormed what we might name ourselves. Picture this: Friday night, we’ve all come off a long week, we are feeling creative and a bit silly and any- and everything was on the table. Ideas ranged from the brilliant but already taken by NPR, “StoryCorps,” to the absurd and comical, “The Vowel Movement,” (thanks, Ben. We love you for this!) to the this-is-great-but-perhaps-not-appropriate-for-a-youth-agency: “The Speakeasy Wordhouse.”

So that leaves us with …? A list of words and phrases that we like but aren’t quite right yet. In no particular order, here are some of them that suggest who we are, what we stand for, and what we want to do:

syndication, syndicate, circulation, circ, stories, story, squad, posse, house, The Syndication House, StorySquad, wordshop, workshop, trust (as a collective, not a value … but that, too), Inc., ink, Ink., radiate, federation, contend, power, empower, youth, voice, the idea of “graffiti” as art and word and activism but not necessarily crime, ground, groundswell, ground up, word power, shape, camp, base camp, image, evoke, blast, generation, “gen” something, currency, ____ by ____, change, citizen, corps, productions, community (…whatever that means), re-vision, revision, (re)vision (kidding, Katie), home, family …

Hmm. We’ve got some thinking to do. Ideas?