Terlingua Woman Pt. 3: Border Crossing

You see the world differently when the ground around you gets so hot even beetles start to sweat. In Texas along the Rio Grande, far from air-conditioned malls, backyard pools and iced frappuccinos, her leathery skin is thick and rules reveal their flaws.

"If you see somebody walking across the desert with a backpack on, you know they're smuggling drugs," she tells us. "Everybody else is too poor to need a backpack."

"The people who live out in the desert, I mean really out there, the Mexicans will break into the first house they see and steal their food." They're not bad people. Just dying of hunger and thirst.

"To protect their homes, folks'll leave food and water out on the porch. Some add a note saying 'help yourself.' And if you write that note in Spanish, they'll even do the dishes."

It's just a fact. Who is she to judge?

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