Stories from Life's Other Side

Hank Williams' song "A Picture From Life's Other Side" talks about the "gallery of pictures" that stands opposite those of "love and of passion...and of youth and of beauty": the gambler who's lost all his money; the old mother home alone, waiting; the heartbroken mother and child. This book extends that gallery to include the stories of those who live largely on the margins of modern day society, be it physically, culturally, or economically. Some of them choose to live there, others live there by default. While they experience the same range of desires and emotions as everyone else in this world, maybe theirs are a little closer to the bone. There's some mourning of what's been lost, some soul searching about what to want, but a lot of acceptance of what there is. Kay Matthews is the chronicler, maybe a little bit of an interpreter, but definitely not the judge. * * * * * * * Kay Matthews is a freelance journalist and editor of "La Jicarita," an online journal of environmental politics. She and her partner Mark Schiller started "La Jicarita" in 1996 as the print newspaper of a watershed watchdog group. The paper soon expanded to investigate environmental and social justice issues all over northern New Mexico. She lives on a farm in El Valle where she raised two children, grows fruit, vegetables, and pasture hay, and served as an acequia commissioner for many years.