Octavio Espejo leads an ordinary life in multiethnic 1967 El Paso: he is raising three children with his wife, Lourdes. Octavio was brought to the U.S. from revolutionary Mexico as a child and talks about the family's roots across the border, but on the whole the family has silently Americanized. The Vietnam War and the counterculture, however, begin to change how his children conceive of themselves and their lives-teenaged twins Gustavo and Xochil in particular.