His Cross To Bear

A few months ago, immigration agents in the US (or perhaps a judge...the details are missing) sent a 25-year-old illegal immigrant named Cruz González Chávez back to his hometown of San Juan del Río, Querétaro. González was the father of two American children with his American wife, but the government wisely decided that what's best for a child is for his father to be deported, because if he were allowed to stay, well, what kind of country would that be for a child to grow up in? (Anyone who suggests the mother and children should have also shipped out to San Juan del Río has never been to San Juan del Río.)

Cruz González Chávez was the kind of guy who, for some unfathomable reason, loved and missed his wife and children in that melancholy Mexican way familiar to anyone who's read The Labyrinth of Solitude. So after a few beers last Sunday, he went outside and put a bullet though his head. We doubt his name will make it into the American newspapers, so we thought we'd mention him here.