It has been more than a month now since a friend and I volunteered at the Mexican border. I wanted to see what was happening there for myself. What I found was a genuine humanitarian crisis. And we all share in the responsibility for it.

The heart of the problem is drugs. The seemingly insatiable appetite in the United States for drugs. Drugs coming north and guns going south.

It came out little by little when anyone told their story. Children as young as 10 had a choice – either join a gang or, in some cases, get shot. Whole families were threatened. People left their homes, their neighborhoods, their villages and their countries to save their children. Some walked thousands of miles.

The police in their villages offered no protection. They were bought off. The politicians, too, were paid by the drug lords.

Every corner store and small business paid for protection. Even the church was losing respect. Drug lords and the local gangs had the money, the power and the protection. They were tearing the social fabric to shreds.

Among the tens of thousands coming, there must be drug dealers and members of gangs, but I never saw any gang tattoos, or any tattoos at all, for that matter.

A long line of people stood before the door of our makeshift office, waiting to get checked in. A sponsor somewhere in the U.S. had agreed to host every one of them until time for their court dates to determine their eligibility for legal amnesty.

A mother with a baby tied to her back stood trembling before boarding a bus. She wore a colorful traditional juipel that identified her village. A volunteer spoke to her softly in Spanish. “Don’t worry, Anna Maria, you won’t have to change buses at all and you have diapers and sandwiches and water to drink in your bag. Everything will be fine. Your sponsor will be waiting for you.”

The young mother burst into tears. “No hablo espanol!” She blurted out the only Spanish she’d memorized. She spoke Poqomchi, one of the Mayan dialects still used in indigenous communities. Then, glancing back at the volunteer, she shifted the baby on her back and bravely boarded the bus.

A group of Catholic sisters had donated money for 50 hotel rooms where I helped out. Each room had two queen beds. One family was assigned to each.

My job was to pack lunches for the trips to the sponsors. Reusable grocery bags worked fine. By bus to New York might take three days. That meant at least 18 sandwiches for each adult or teenager, and bottles of water to be refilled along the way. For babies, diapers and infant formula were needed.

Sixty to 100 people were leaving each day. Some had plane tickets with connections to places like Chicago or Minneapolis. How brave they were venturing into the unknown, how full of hope.

Sometimes at the end of the day, there would only be a few sandwiches left. In the morning, there might be hundreds or even thousands. Had people been up all night making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches or salami and cheese sandwiches. Sometimes a case of fresh fruit would appear, or 1,000 toothbrushes, or cases and cases of water, razors or combs. It was as if the shoemaker’s elves had come during the night.

It was amazing how the El Paso community helped. Many had family from Central America and donated a few hours of their time a week. Even the maids helped. “These are my people,” one said, gathering the dirty clothing the refugees had come in. During the night, after her shift, she washed and dried them all. What a treasure these local volunteers were with their fluent Spanish and cultural understanding.

Journalists with their cameras did their part, too.

For lunch and dinner, local restaurants provided meals.

The hotel furnished waffles in the shape of Texas for breakfast. The refugees loved them.

Was the whole town involved?

This generosity makes me proud of my country. This is the America I love, with the values I love. People coming together, taking care of each other, valuing each other. Loving the stranger.

Sometimes before going to sleep at night, I think about them. I imagine them as rivers spreading to every part of our nation. Rivers of hope and courage, determination and bravery. We could use some more of that.

Donna Mack is a retired small business owner who lives in Pueblo with her husband Robert.