Border Fence is conquered by size 5 green shoes

What is now all too familiar along the USA and Mexico border is the imposing border fence which separates these two countries. It is the border fence that most do not want to talk about.

Yet the border fence is there and it has defined what the border is all about today.

In the open desert, it is about a line drawn in the sand that should not be crossed and others dareto cross it.

Along the urban border, it is looking at a steel fence and probably the largest one you will ever see. Everyone knows that fences are made to keep out someone but for a city, that may be too much of a mis-guided statement passed down by our country’s statesmen to far removed from its impact.

It seems to be that the new slogan is “Come on down to our border city so you cannot see the other side.”

But there is this little secret going on at a foreknown border inception called El Paseo Internacional del Norte and it comes in size 5.

And this takes us to a place in the future that will play out for decades when some young child gazing in the funny way they do with their little tummy full from lunch and watching TV.

This child then sees an announcement for kids to wear their walking shoes to El Paseo Internacional Del Norte walk on the marked foot prints of Juan de Oñate. This is to celebrate the Spanish thanksgiving along the Rio Grande by the first Spanish travelers coming north through what is now known as the state of Chihuahua. They arrived in this region and were among the first Europeans to set foot on what is now the US Southwest. They rested nearby the Rio Grande for a few days and later during the week celebrated their successful arrival with a feast.

As the story is known locally, it would be the stop of a trip which would eventually lead to settling the areas between Santa Fe and the city of Chihuahua even before the English pilgrims set foot on the Eastern coast of the United States. In time, the route was given the name, El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro, which travelers from Mexico city would use to reach Santa Fe.

So this child runs to their shoe pile and digs out a pair of shoes and presents it to mom where the child announces that they are ready. Mom looks at those shoes which she knows don’t fit any more but says nothing and only nods in approval with a warm loving smile.

Some days before the event, as this child continues to anticipate the day to walk along the foot prints, mom and child find themselves at a shoe store looking at walking shoes.

She asks “Do you want to wear shoes like the early travelers did for the walk tomorrow?” Of course this child is thrilled and cannot contain such enthusiasm.

And now mom finds herself looking at green running shoes which she knows those pioneers never wore but today is not about a history lesson.

When the day arrives, several thousand children show up in their green, red, pink, blue, brown, white running shoes. It is crazy, fun, and chaotic as children and their parents walk along El Paseo Internacional del Norte annual April pioneers day and wave across to the children on the other side of the river.

El Paseo Internacional del Norte will prove to be an important civic development. The goal will be to bring people to the borderland where it will be safe to bring families to share time together, and this event will be just another testimony of its success in border security.

When green shoes and many others are the ones running around the borderland, the day will come to this foreknown border inception where the border fence becomes a foot note in history while the many shoe prints and El Paseo Internacional del Norte will live on in people’s hearts and memory.

It will be part of the memories of these thousands of children and parents that will then make up the new structure along the future border known only as El Paseo Internacional del Norte.

In the end, the built fences will never be any match for the size 5 shoes that will eventually invade the borderland along this long outstretched platform on both sides of the Rio Grande.

From all of us whom have already been there in our hearts and minds, please close your eyes and let us welcome you to El Paseo Internacional del Norte as you take a walk along it with your loved ones. Don’t forget to bring the camera and take a picture.

Let “Borderland, most photographed place in the US,” be the new mantra and let children learn from their history class about the past dark days of the border fence.