By Nathan J King
Green Valley, a senior community, neighboring Tucson, is where I have embarked. Stepping out of the charter bus taking note of miles stretched and stained turquoise green. The western horizon dams the valley, with oxidizing copper mines.
Unrest and unkempt, I am alone and the one who had held up the charter by half an hour in Phoenix. A Samaritan takes pace with me as I gather my wits. She is fragile, and her features are boyish; she strikes up conversation in a native New York tongue that has probably taken sixty years to perfect.
A sister organization to Tucson Samaritans, these seniors were birthed in January of 2005 supplying food, water and medical supplies to nomadic Mexican migrants.
These particular Samaritans are outreaching to illegal border crossers birds eye from their front porch. Our group of college students is herded before a barbed gate; there is sign next to it stating: STATE TRUST LAND–NO TRESPASSING–Enter only with written permission.
We make our way around though a wash a hundred yards to the south and crawl under the fence, tromping like red-coats through desert, which appears to be cattle ranching land, hence the steaming cattle fodder evaporating away with other mid-morning scents.
