Max Aguilera-Hellweg

“I'm a product of the border. My grandmother fled Durango, Mexico during the Mexican Revolution to the United States and settled in Chicago.  My grandmother loved Chicago and gave birth to my mom and my mom’s two oldest brothers in Chicago, USA. After the stock market crash, the entire family, including the three American kids were forced to relocate to Mexico.  More than 400,000 repatriates, many of them citizens of the United States by birth, were deported to Mexico. My father was born and raised in El Paso.  When my mom was in her late teens, she lived in Juarez, crossed the border, and worked for my dad. They moved to California, where I was born, in Fresno. Farmworker country, but we lived in the suburbs. When we returned to El Paso to visit relatives, we'd cross the bridge into Juarez so my parents could drink, and my sister and I could buy bull's horns, sombreros, and velvet Jesus paintings. The streets were packed, I held onto my mom's hand in fear I'd lose her grip. But I did. I spun around, and there she was.  Mexico staring me in the face -- a stump on a skateboard, amputated, her hand held out begging for Pesos…“