El Paso—Time Is a Social Construct

To me, one of the most fascinating things about the border is that no matter how many times you try to leave ityou always end up back there.Sometimes you end up back at the border physically and other times it is mentally, spiritually, through a dream or in another dimension.Over the course of my lifetime, I have been taken out of the border time and time again and yet I feel that no matter how far away I am from that open wound -una herida abierta-I have never fully escaped the violence, the trauma, and the pain that live there, that live within me.Being of or from the border is por vida.I was born in El Paso, Texas, on May 29, 1990.My mother, Carmen, and my father, Miguel Angel, were both born in Ciudad Jurez, Chihuahua, Mexico.Ellos crecieron during a time when the border was a lot more fluid and porous.Both sides of my familia have had relatives living on both sides of the border for generations and we still do to this very day.Being that my parents both grew up intimately familiar with various types of violencia y pobreza, they agreed that it was best for our young family to leave la frontera and seek a more stable life somewhere else.The story goes that we moved from El Paso to Santa Maria, California, when I was still an infant.One of the first fotos of me is in our baby blue Ford trokita.My mom is holding me up in her lap and there's a cobija covering the window.Rumor has it that I was born with enough hair on my head to braid.Everyone says I got my hair from my dad-dark, thick, wiry, and a lot of it.Growing up, both my sister and I were expected to have long natural hair.Mom and Dad did not let us cut it.I remember not liking this because of how thick and heavy my hair was.My mom would braid my hair when I was little before school and it hurt