Hello to everyone from South Texas!

My name is Esmeralda Zuniga but I respond to Emi, Esmi, or genius extraordinaire. I, like my VISTA partner in crime Liz, am at the Edinburg Texas office. This is my first year in either AmeriCorps or VISTA, and it is pretty exciting. I got to meet a great group of interesting people on my PSO in New Mexico. It was beautiful and very educational, though the Juniper was out to get me; I returned intact (barely) lol.

I am, let's just say 30ish, and am raising a beautiful little girl who is the apple of my eye. She is 5 and quite precocious. If you hang around her long enough she will school you in Art, Politics, and -thanks to Google- can describe the difference between starving and famished.
A brief history, I graduated from college in 2002 from Texas A&M University Corpus Christi, GO ISLANDERS!!! I am about a semester short of my Masters from the University of Texas-Pan American. I swear the thesis will be my undoing!

I taught kindergarten for a year and decided that I didn't know how or in what way, but I wanted to make a difference in not only the children's lives, but the parents as well. I wasn't quite sure how I would do it, but trusted that if I took a giant leap of faith, somehow some way, I would find my way.

With my first summer off I began volunteering at the local political party office. I was hired to be a volunteer coordinator and before I knew it, I was the executive director. I was simultaneously heading up an Alternative Certification Program (ACP) for teaching certification. On top of public relations, marketing, and negotiations, I learned some very important things through this experience:

1. You can survive off 4 hours of sleep a night, though it is not recommended.
2. 15-hour workdays are a walk in the park, if you don't need things like clean laundry, showers, or time with your kids.
3. If you serve food, they will come, no matter the crowd.
4. If the person traveling is important enough, people will lend you an airplane.
5. Political campaigns-though no one tells you in the beginning- are war and you can expect casualties. If you escape with your reputation intact, it's been a good day.
6. Non-profits rock my socks off- seriously- these are people who fight the good fight and expect very little in return, which is good because they will get little more than the satisfaction of a job well done.

Through the political, I found non-profits. I begin volunteering for Food Bank of the Rio Grande Valley and La Union del Pueblo Entero (L.U.P.E.). One of my proudest moments was being asked to design the shirts for the Cesar Chavez march 2 years in a row. I will happily volunteer to do them every year. I would have to say that the experience that impacted me the most was volunteering with the local arm of the 2008 Equal Voice for America's Families Campaign by the Marguerite Casey Foundation. I truly learned a lot about capacity building through them.
Around Christmas time my best friend told me that there was an opening for someone with an Education background and who possessed some of my talents. I looked into the job and wanted on board very badly. When I saw it was a VISTA position I realized I would have to take a significant pay cut to work for them, but the ultimate rewards would be more than monetary. I would be able to look back and know I made a difference in my community. I realized this was the leap of faith I had been searching for. This was the opportunity I had been looking for to make a difference in not only the children's lives but the parents as well. I had somehow, some way, come full circle and found my way.

Was it hard to make this decision? I would like to lie and say ‘Not at all, I'm magnanimous that way' but alas I would be lying. It was a tough decision to make as a single parent, but it also was sort of easy. I wanted to do something that allowed me to be a role model for my daughter. To show her that if you care about people and you put out that vibe into the universe, it eventually comes back to you.

I am proud to be an AmeriCorps VISTA, and glad that it’s with the Texas HIPPY Program.

- Esmeralda ‘Emí’ Zuñiga