FAQ: future destinations, goals

You took an extended holiday break. When will your break end? Where will you pick up the route? Do you plan to continue the visits to community members in each town as you've done so far?

I'm planning to arrive in Laredo, Texas by the end of January. I have to stick around for my audio recorder, and I still have a lot of writing to do.

What happened to your recorder?

The short story is that MP3 player/audio recorder committed suicide. It gave up all will to live, and with it went six weeks of conversations—in other words, all my work. I sent the corpse to the manufacturer for a fresh one, sans those conversations.

This means that, yes, I plan to continue my visits. I don't have much of a choice. I'll probably spend another month in the Lower Rio Grande Valley, more than likely later rather than sooner.

Will you be in Arizona's southern deserts (border-crossing land) in the hot season? Do you have any thoughts on what you might see or people you might meet if that happens?

You betchya. My plan is to work with, well, we'll call them the migrant search and rescue groups in the summer. Prior to that, I’ll spend time with an ASU alum who is directing legal observation of the Minutemen on the Texas border. I expect a balanced perspective: the thoughts of voices of those who are providing humanitarian aid to those crossing over, those actually crossing over, and those who don't want anybody crossing over. It's going to be rather intense. Humanity will be as open, raw and festering as I will ever see it. Beautiful even.

What do you want to accomplish on this trip?

My ultimate goal is to have a stake in humanizing the border. I want to make the project real in the sense that, when reading the book, you will come to see not only my maturation as a sort of free-wheeling student but only understand what those who live there have to say about the border, their jobs, their lives. I sincerely intend for the reader to see people, not just words on paper.

I intend to broaden my own horizons. To know what the Lower Rio Grande Valley is like in the fall, to see how passionate people are about their culture, to eat their food, to make friends, to have bumps in the road, to go through the whole range of emotions and experience that comes with being a very willing and open participant in an on-the-ground education… that’s what I’m after. I don’t just want a better understanding of the border. I want to feel it.

This whole thing started off as an adventure and learning experience. That’s what I intend to accomplish, that’s what I intend to share. I consider this a community endeavor. My voice, others’ voices… it is all a part of that. The book is the consequence. The conversations and the experiences are the substance.