El Paso, My Home

I arrived on a plane to El Paso in late December of 1997. I was stationed at Fort Bliss, which was my last duty station in the United States Army.

It was love at first sight for me. I grew up in a Mexican neighborhood back home in Phoenix. The "bad part of town". So when I arrived in El Paso, it was familiar to me even though I'd never been here before. 

The first thing I was impressed by - and what quickly made me fall in love with her - was her people. Paseños are the most kind, welcoming, and loving people anywhere. I know that those of you reading this that live somewhere else think I'm just another Texan bragging about their town. Or you maybe you think there's nice people everywhere and El Paso isn't particularly special in that category. 

Thats because you've never been here. El Paso is everything I'm saying it is and more. The people really are what make this town great. 

Its also the vibrant colors of the desert sky at sunset. Its the menudo at any diner on Alameda. Its the missions we have - the oldest in Texas - its our history, our culture, our Spanglish.

But its mostly our people. 

I've never had a relative or friend come to visit me in this town that didn't absolutely love it here. 

Its tailgating at a Miner game - yes we know we are going to lose but no one has more fun losing football games than El Pasoans. We love live music, dancing Selena's cumbias, and singing along to sad Vicente Fernandez songs. 

We listen to oldies on Sunday while we grill and drink beer. We wear football jerseys to mass on Sunday. 

No one loves a good party like Paseños.

We are home to the best Mexican food on the planet. 

We are huggers. I laugh when I see out-of-towners get their first uncomfortable hug from a total stranger because the look on their face is equal parts surprise, discomfort, confusion, and happiness. 

We are a big city, but we've never lost our small town charm. Paseños even have their own way of greeting one another - outside of hugs, did I mention we hug a lot? Within a minute of meeting another Paseño, you always ask - "So where did you go to high school?"

I always miss out on that conversation because I'm not a Paseño by birth, I'm a Paseño by choice - and the grace of God. As another Texan once said, "I wasn't born in Texas, but I got here as fast as I could." I'll always be proud of where I am from and grew up, but El Paso has been my home since the late 90's. 

I was raised in a big city and in big cities you avert eye contact on the street. You don't talk to people. You don't do anything that might be perceived as a challenge. Why?

Because its not safe to.

But not here in El Paso. When we walk down the street and see another Paseño, we always say "buenos dias/buenas tardes/noches" depending on the time of day. We stand so that elders can sit on public transportation. 

We are the town that has taken in refugees from hurricanes here in the US and fed refugees coming to this country for a better life. 

El Paso is about love. 

Some piece of garbage drove 9 or 10 hours from north of Dallas to come to our town and hunt brown people. He preyed on people that were unarmed and never harmed him. Children and the elderly. 

And we have to actually not be afraid to name the devil. This was racism. The man was a white supremacist. We have to stop skirting around that reality. 

He did it because he sees brown people - not just the immigrants - but all of us, as "invaders". In our own country, we are still seen as invaders, foreigners, or outsiders. Yet we have communities in the El Paso area like San Elizario that during World War II, had the highest number of citizens serve in the war per capita. 

We are the home of Medal of Honor recipient Ambrosio Guillen. Latinos have been awarded more Medals of Honor than any other ethnic or racial group. 

Latinos have been leaders in business, academics, and basically every single walk of life. Hell, El Paso is home to an Astronaut!

We didn't cross the border, the border crossed us. 

And yet we now have definitive proof that there are people that exist that want to see us gone. 

But again, El Paso is about love. 

We are one of the first major cities to desegregate. We are home to the 1966 Texas Western Miners that was the first all-black NCAA Men's Basketball Championship team.

Award-winning artist Khalid - wasn't born here. Comes from a military town and moved around a lot. What city does he rep hard? Chucotown baby!

We are that world-famous West Texas town of El Paso. The shooter spoke about race-mixing in his manifesto, so of course he hates El Paso. The most famous song about El Paso is a song about a white guy who fell in love with a Mexican girl named Felina.

We are everything that guy hates. A town of good people, who don't care about who you are when it comes to love, and we have Latino leaders. 

And God bless us for it!

If you have Mexican heritage, there's a good chance your family passed through the Pass of the North. We are the brown Ellis Island. 

We are the Second Chance City, the place that welcomes you no matter who you are. The place that lets you start all over if you need to, and will embrace you like a relative.

We take care of one another here. The crime scene wasn't even secure yet and El Pasoans were flooding blood banks to donate blood. And other Paseños were taking the ones in line to donate blood, food and drink while they waited. 

That is what El Pasoans do. 

Because El Paso is about love. 

Because El Paso is family. 

And you don't mess with anyone's family.