“I wish this book had been available for me when I was making my foolish way in my perilous 20s, but how glorious that it’s available now.”—Sandra Cisneros, author of The House on Mango Street
A Colombian-Cuban daughter’s story of becoming her own person, finding herself in community, and building a new queer life
Daisy Hernández was raised by women: Her mother, who warned of la envidia and men who seduce with pastries. Her Tía Dora, who bemoaned that her niece was turning out to be una india instead of American. Another auntie, who said that when 2 people are close, they are bound to become like uña y mugre, fingernails and dirt. These women taught lessons of love, money, and race, learned from their own experiences of migration, colonization, y cariño.
Hernández celebrates the 10th anniversary of the book’s first publication with a new preface. She reflects on the book’s impact and on how we can lean into love and into each other, even when each morning’s news cycle is saturated with heartbreak and pain. In 3 parts, the author explores the facets of her childhood and culture that define who she is as a bisexual, first-generation Latina.
She talks of telling her mother, “Estoy saliendo con mujeres,” and her Tía Chuchi breaking out into a Hail Mary and hanging up on her. Daisy recounts how, when NAFTA shuttered local factories in her hometown on the outskirts of New York City, she had to translate unemployment forms for her parents, moving between English and Spanish, as well as private and collective fears. And she reflects on her tenure at the New York Times, when the publication was rocked by the biggest plagiarism scandal in its history, sparking debates about the role of race in the newsroom.
A heartfelt collection that reckons with family, sexuality, and culture, A Cup of Water Under My Bed is a daughter’s story of becoming her own person, finding herself in community, and building a new queer life.
“Gorgeously written from start to finish.”
—Boston Globe
“By the end of this beautiful book, Daisy Hernández, a queer American Latina, has threaded Spanish and English together to create an inimitable new language in a brave and brilliant negotiation of a multilingual world.”
—Los Angeles Review of Books
“Hernández writes with honesty, intelligence, tenderness, and love.”
—Sandra Cisneros, author of The House on Mango Street
On Love: A Note for the Second Edition
Condemned
ONE
Before Love, Memory
Stories She Tells Us
The Candy Dish
A Cup of Water Under My Bed
TWO
Even If I Kiss a Woman
Queer Narratives
Qué India
THREE
Only Ricos Have Credit
My Father’s Hands
Blackout
Después
Agradecimientos