SFCC Thinks Johnny Martinez Has a Story Worth Telling
As Johnny Martinez ordered a cup of hot tea at the DeVargas Center Starbucks, a woman sidled up to him and said, kiddingly, “John the Babe!” He looked a little sheepish and said, “Her sister was my high school sweetheart.”
At 49, John P. (“Johnny”) Martinez is a long way from high school. And back in 1976, the year he graduated from Santa Fe High, he never would have considered going to college. And he definitely would never have imagined being the honorary student speaker at Santa Fe Community College’s graduation Friday.
But in the past eight years, Martinez has turned his life around, from an alcohol and cocaine addict to a man who now wants to set an example for his nieces and nephews.
“I want to let them see there are more possibilities than just ‘getting in with the state’ and getting retirement and good benefits,” Martinez said. “If Uncle Johnny can do it, then they know they can do it.”
Today, Martinez is one semester into a program toward his bachelor’s degree at the College of Santa Fe, thanks to an agreement between the two schools that lets associate degree holders receive an 80 percent tuition reduction in any of CSF’s traditional degrees.
Martinez, who is working toward a humanities degree, said the decision to go to college was not entirely his own.
“My sponsor told me I should go to college,” Martinez said of his support person in a 12-step recovery program.
Martinez had worked his way from being a paid staffer at a recovery treatment center to being director of develop- ment. But he saw that beyond that particular program, he might not be able to find a similar job.
“I had no credentials, no college degree,” he said. So going to college seemed the next step. “A degree became an important part of saying who I am.
“I went in with an idea,” he said of starting college. “I’ve always been able to communicate — whether it’s public speaking with my church or with the tour business I once did — and not be self-conscious.”
Never stopping
His goal for his education became the idea of expanding his ability to communicate.
“I’m a generation that didn’t speak Spanish,” Martinez said. “It wasn’t encouraged.”
So he first studied toward an associate’s degree in Spanish. Now he’s also interested in any medium in which he can carry a message, from music and art to computers.
And he’s especially proud of his 3.98 grade-point average at the community college.
“I went a few semesters with straight A’s,” Martinez said. “My grades in high school were not anything I was proud of.”
He also discovered the community college’s servicelearning department, where he could earn college credit for doing volunteer work in the community. Martinez landed at the Santa Fe Playhouse, where he has worked as an actor, stage manager and house manager, and eventually became a member of the board of directors.
Martinez occasionally gets paying jobs at the playhouse that — along with doing some work for his brother and housesitting — help him keep his living costs low and let him concentrate on his classes.
“What I love about the playhouse is that it brings joy to people’s lives,” Martinez said.
Martha Sorensen, director of service learning at the college, said, “Johnny’s enthusiasm and his genuine love for people really stand out. He makes a real commitment to what he decides to get involved with.”
Those were some of the traits that led Sorenson’s department to nominate Martinez as the graduation’s student speaker. His name then went before a college committee that approved his selection.
Bouncing around
The middle child of five, Martinez looked at life with a practical sense. In high school, he took half his classes at a vocational-technical school in Santa Fe and became a machinist upon graduation. He then worked for a large corporation here, and when it downsized, the experience sparked his entrepreneurial side.
“I wasn’t going to leave my fate to a corporate structure,” he said.
After buying some darkroom equipment from the corporation’s graphic arts department, Martinez decided to pursue an interest in photography.
“I became the official photographer in ’83 for the Fiesta Council,” Martinez said.
That led to a business shooting weddings for several years.
“But after you’ve shot a couple hundred weddings, it stops being fun,” he said.
In 1992, Martinez and his father bought a van and started a small business leading tours for Elderhostel in spots ranging from Chimayó and Taos to Pecos and Acoma Pueblo.
During those years, he also worked for his brother, a machinist, and co-managed a rock band named Rozy.
“It was an excuse to party: ‘Hey, this is what rockers do!’ ’’ Martinez said.
“By ’99, I had developed a full-blown addiction,” he said. “But I had used for the better part of 25 years.”
Finding meaning
Still, he was searching for something more meaningful. In fact, a friend had given him a book by Eric Butterworth, senior minister at The Unity Center of New York City, called “Discover the Power Within You,” that had a great effect on him.
“I would take that book and read it and read it and think, ‘My God, there’s a way out!’ ’’ Martinez said. “It just wasn’t enough at the time.
“My dad, and my entire family really, were instrumental in helping me get into treatment,” he said. Martinez entered the Rio Grande Treatment Center in Embudo for a month. “I surrendered,” he said. “That idea of surrendering is real. Opening to a spiritual life really works.”
While there, he developed a friendship with one of the counselors, Les Tennyson.
“I knew as long as this man was on the planet, I was going to be OK,” Martinez said.
But just a few months later, Tennyson died of complications from a heart attack. Martinez said there was only one thing that kept him from using again. “I just knew: ‘I can’t disrespect his memory of what he did for me,’ ’’ he said.
After playing guitar at Tennyson’s funeral, Martinez recalled, “I came straight back to Santa Fe and went to (Cocaine Anonymous).”
Tennyson’s death was the first of six deaths of close friends Martinez would experience over the next four months.
“A person not in early recovery would have a hard time, much less someone fresh out of treatment,” Martinez said. “It was a powerful lesson for me.”
During that time, the same friend who had given him the Butterworth book suggested he go to the Unity Church of Santa Fe. Martinez said he was a little resistant at first, not making the connection between the book and the local church.
Today, he points to his involvement with Unity as crucial to his life. He has been a prayer chaplain and a worship assistant at the church. In 2001, he traveled to New York City to meet Butterworth, with whom he had been corresponding.
“To the extent I can be conscious of love,” Martinez said, “I don’t have to live in fear.” If you go
Santa Fe Community College’s 2008 graduation is scheduled for 5 p.m. Friday in the William C. Witter Fitness Education Center. This year’s 356 graduates will earn 389 degrees and certificates, the highest number of degrees ever awarded by the college in a single year. The average age of the graduates is 34.7, with ages ranging from 17 to 71. The ceremony will be broadcast live on public access station Comcast Cable 16.
Luci Tapahonso, an award-winning Navajo poet and short-story author, will be the keynote speaker, and graduate John P. (“Johnny”) Martinez will be the honorary student speaker.
