Hello fellow citizens
Please help me start a letter writing campaign to Mexico residents. The following is a completely true story that explains:

I was walking around Coronado on my daily walk and I thought, "I wonder if I bought eight pairs of male and female bushy tailed squirrels (you know someone is selling squirrel on the internet) could I, over time, get squirrels all over the island?" I was talking to my art teacher about my idea and she said "why don't you do something that would help someone, instead."

A few years ago, right after we moved to California , I was going to the outlet mall near the border and missed the exit. I was surprised to find out you can just drive right on in to Mexico. The minute I crossed the border the navigation system in my hybrid Lexus stopped working. As did my cell phone.

My car had less than a quarter tank of gas. I found myself in what looked like the downtown area. I rolled down my window and ask a car full of teenagers how to get back to the border. Their concern for me and ernest desire to help surprised and touched me. They sat through a green light trying to speak english and direct me, but the language barrier was a problem. They even made a u turn to come back to try to help me. I won't ever forget them all speaking and pointing at once.

Unfortunately, the light changed and with people honking I lost them. I must have talked to three or four people in the area and all of them were kind and trying to help me. I ended up on some road that was a long dived highway. It went on and on with no place to turn around.

Some man in a truck was driving next to me and when I would speed up he would too and if I slowed down he would too. Then he was trying to move into my lane. I don't know, but it seemed like he was trying to run me off the road . So I abruptly tuned off into some neighborhood. I would say this was a rather poor area.

At this point, I had been lost for about an hour. My gas gage was on empty and the man in the truck had really freaked me out. I was scared. I pulled over and was trying to calm down and think. I put head on the steering wheel when an older gentleman knocked on my window. Needless to say I jumped. This man was working in his beautiful garden and came over to see why I was crying and he wanted to help. The kindnesses in this old man's face transcended all language. I was amazed at the calming effect he had on me even though I couldn't understand his words.

After a few minutes of unsuccessful communication. I went on my way. Driving at about 18 miles per hour, using only the electric part of the hybrid so I wouldn't use what little gas I had left. After about another hour of this I came upon a group of three or four, what appeared to be, taxis and their drivers outside of a market. I was attempting to employ them to drive me to the border but because they had no idea what I was saying after a while they started shooing me away like I was crazy or drunk or something.

By now I am really lost and have been so for several hours. I am sitting in my car in a neighborhood when a women came out of her house to ask what was wrong in very broken english. I started crying. I was so relieved. I told her of my plight. She said 'I have to pick up my mother and then my daughter from school.' At the time I wasn't sure what she was saying. Later I figured it out.

So I sat in front of her house for about 30 minutes when I see her get into her very old and quite beat up car. She said "follow me." I did!

We went to her mothers home and she came out and tried to talk to me, she was so kind and loving like her daughter. Then, we went to her daughter's school to pick her up. Then, these three wonderful ladies drove 50 minutes in heavy traffic to the border. They pointed for me to go left and they went right.

To this day I tear up when I think about her unselfish kindness. I regret so much that I never got a chance to thank her. I include her and her family in my prayers everyday. While waiting in line at the border I encountered a women and her two small children begging. I gave her all but twenty dollars of my money (approx. $350). The woman who was begging had little or no response to the money. She looked dead inside, no light in her eyes at all. I figured someone or something had really killed her sprit. When I crossed back to the US, I got some gas and finally got to the ladies room. When I got back to Coronado, I noticed how clean, trimmed and perfect everything was. No pot holes in the road, no graffiti, no trash, no abandoned cars. I was never really that scared because I don't believe just because a person is poor that makes them a criminal. Not to say everyone I saw that day was poor.

Now back to the squirrels. I am not stupid. I know not to introduce non-native plants or animals into any area so I was never really serious about the squirrels. My new and better idea is to start a letter writing campaign to local newspapers and internet sites such as eCoronado.com and of course the internet sites and news papers the people in the border towns would see. I would like the people of these border towns to know we Americans don't think they are a bunch of criminals. It seems like that is all you hear in the media.

I know it can be dangerous in Mexico . That is why I mentioned the man in the truck trying to run me off the road. Please join me by telling your good stories about Mexico's border towns.