They pass through thousands of communities, finding temporary homes in labor camps, trailers, or cheap motels, sometimes sleeping by the side of the road, under bridges, or in the fields and orchards where they work. They arrive where they're needed, guided to the fields by intermediaries and informal networks, by necessity and, at times, desperation. It's Sunday afternoon at the height of the tobacco season. The sky is clear and the sun, though low in the sky, still shines brightly. The air is beginning to cool and there is a lazy, relaxed mood to the labor camp.
Workers lounge around, talking, sitting under trees, watching television, sleeping, and drinking.
Instead of resting, he went to a nearby pond, returning to the camp with a bucketful of small, silvery fish. Spencer has just finished cleaning and scaling the fish, covering the finger-sized filets with aluminum foil. A dog passes by, snapping up the insides of the fish from the ground by Shorty's chair. There are flies everywhere. Spencer is a small, dark, wiry man.