This morning, June 6, 2016, I heard a story on the car radio from the regional NPR station from Mexico. I always sit up and listen whenever I hear anything about Mexico as I have a lifelong fondness for anything Mexican, in contrast to the lamentable anti-Mexican, anti-immigration hyperbole that seems so common nowadays much to my personal regret.
The piece was from an “inserted” American radio journalist who described riding in a several car private “convoy” of cars traveling over 250 miles into Mexico, up to Reynosa at the US-Mexican border. The families apparently made this trip several times a year. the families had moved to the US in the last several years, transplanting, themselves, their businesses and lives to the US out of fears for their own safety in the narco-terrorist dominated realities of Mexico. I was somewhat shocked to hear that the extended families had indeed experienced some of their relatives being kidnapped in past years which clearly influenced their collective decisions to relocate to the US. They returned to their hometowns to see older relatives, participate in family reunions and hometown gatherings and festivals. They did so taking extreme precautions usually arranging for police car escorts for defense and safety against bandits, kidnappers and the like. On this occasion, they were not able to have police escorts and the journalist’s anxiety and fear was tangible. Fortunately for all, they arrived safely in Reynoso. However, they experienced one close call when just behind them three young men stopped a car behind them.
Pen and Psychiatrist 