Yesterday we met two woman, Laurie and Jennifer, who live together in a beautiful house on a ranch. Their garden was strewn with animal skulls, pottery, and bird feeders. They introduced us to Jillian, their trailblazing canine. We walked along their property with Jill in the lead. It was not easy. The sand at the bottom of dried riverbeds bore its way into our shoes. Cacti scattered paths like sea urchins, clinging to pant legs.
We were lucky to have an unusually cool day. Migrants are not often so lucky. This was proven by the three graves we visited. They were made by Jennifer and Laurie at sites where the found the bodies of migrants. They couldn't tell how they died exactly, but probably from dehydration or hypothermia . One was a teenager, probably younger than all of us. But those are just the bodies that have been found. A corpse does not last long in the desert. Heat and scavengers get to them in a matter of weeks. And nobody is there to tell the family. They always have to wonder; where is my son? My daughter? My brother? My sister? Where?
As we kept walking along the wasteland, I was lucky to get a few words with Jennifer. Come to find out, she is an immigrant herself. But not from Mexico, and not from South America, but Denmark. She spends her winters here in Arizona, working on her photography. It was fascinating to speak to someone so involved in the immigration issue, and who is an immigrant herself.
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