Alaska is about as far from Arizona as you can get and still be in the United States. Not only is it physically far away, the temperature, people, landscape, and hours of sunlight are at opposite extremes. Since leaving Arizona at the beginning of November, I’ve had a hard time bringing the border and my experiences there to my life amidst the snow and dark here in Alaska.
I was brought back to the border today. I got news that there was a story published in the LA Times about a friend of mine, Luis Luna (http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-deport-luis-20120108,0,1526985,full.story). I met Luis when I was volunteering with No More Deaths at a migrant shelter in Nogales, Mexico. Every time I would go down to volunteer in Nogales we would hang out. When friends of mine, Heidi and Alex, were visiting from Minnesota we went to watch Luis play in a basketball tournament (see photo). There are lawyers working on a case to bring Luis back to the United States, as well as senators working on his behalf. Still, the article struck me. Struck me for the audacity of our immigration policies, but perhaps most for the struggle of a friend as I run dogs through the wilderness of Alaska. Scooping dog poop in the morning, or running dogs under the dark skies, I wonder how these two worlds, the southern border with it’s desert and immigration struggle, might come together with the northern border with it’s dark sky and open wilderness.
