The Welcome Fire

“Once you’ve walked and left footprints in the canyon a part of you will always be here,” Daniel said.  What he didn’t say was that Canyon de Chelly, Arizona will call you back. And so, it has for over 30 years.Every return has been different yet somehow always the same.  On one occasion I was joined by 13 others. Some had been to the Canyon before, some never.  But all had heard the call.  It was October, 6 a.m. and dark in Santa Fe when we started the journey, none of us including me sure of what lay ahead but truly ready to go on the adventure.

First, we offered cornmeal to feed the directions, the morning, our journey, the vehicles and each other and all others.  It was an Indigenous tradition from the Southwest I had been shown to do, and almost every early dawn whether it was downtown Washington, D.C., Kolkata, India or my own backyard in Santa Fe, I had done so. Dinè (Navajo) elder Annie Kahn, in the spirit world as of this writing, once led me in dawn prayer, when the stars were shining and a thin line of light threaded its way across the eastern horizon.  She said it was a special time of “Hòzòn”  (beauty in the Dinè language) when prayers could be sent and heard most clearly. Annie was and is still a light in the dark for me and many others.

Offerings made, we traveled on past pine clad mountains, the looming flat-topped volcanic Tsi Ping (Pedernal) peak made famous by artist Georgia O’Keeffe, through red sandstone cliffs of Gallina, the rolling plains near Regina, past billboards, gas stations and fast food eateries of Bloomfield and Farmington.

We stopped as if compelled by some invisible force near the visually stunning and dramatic immensity of a sharply jagged dark peak commonly known as Shiprock.  No ships around here, though.  It was a misnomer.  The Dinè named the peak Tse Bit’a’i, “rock with wings” which refers to the legend of a great bird that brought the Dinè from the north to their present lands.  Other traditional stories surround this mountain which thrusts starkly upwards into the cobalt blue sky with its “wings” of volcanic rock radiating north and south from the central formation.

Traveling westward we snaked our way over the Lukachukai Mountains, with stunning views towards Tse Bit’ a’ i’ in the east, then dropped down through massive red sandstone cliffs to the west, eventually reaching the mouth of Canyon de Chelly and the Dinè family who would be our guides for four days.

From the Earth Walks I remember:

  • At the beginning of our descent down the long and winding trail from the canyon rim, Roshi Richard Baker’s answer to Joan Halifax in her Zen training: She asked, “Roshi, there is the path and there is the temple at the end of the path. What is the meaning of the path?”  His response: “Joan, the path IS the temple.” Step by step, some labored, we threaded our way down, then reached our new home for three days in the canyon.  We left our footprints in the sand, soul signatures that would call some of us back here again.Guide Daniel Staley’s cousin Esther Bia who accompanied us shared, “My mother said to always leave a little food on your plate for the ‘hungry spirit.’ In times of need you will be helped.”
  • At dawn, Daniel’s flute and prayer chants echoed against the dark cliffs against a sea of infinite stars, meteors streaking across the horizon. Daniel told us on the trail down: “Whenever you need, face the canyon wall and let everything go that needs to go.  It will help change you.”
  • I woke up in the tent the first morning with persistent joint pains gone! Where did they go? Someone said, “To Mother Earth!”  I felt joy and energy enough to run the canyon.
  • We did service work at a canyon resident’s land, digging the fence line free of sand blown over by fierce winds; clearing the fields of dead and down wood and hauling heavy sheet rock from a truck to the house.
  • Then we visited the home of another resident in the canyon.  It was an amazing contrast of nearby ancient cliff dwellings in the canyon wall and a set of active solar panels generating electricity for the house. Even though it was a bright sunny afternoon, she and her grandson lit a fire outdoors, a traditional welcome to visitors. We shared lunch and her family stories.
  • During 35 mile and hour swirling gusts of wind we shook ourselves out of old habits and thoughts through a sweat lodge. It is as if the winds carried away our prayers to where they needed to go. When we were out of the lodge the winds calmed.  As we began the ceremony, a hawk flew to a perch atop the canyon wall, overlooking our doings.  I thought: this is the spirit of Daniel’s grandparents, on whose land sat. His family was here and we had become part of the family as well.
  • When we first arrived at the campsite, Esther urged us to build a fire as soon as possible, to let everyone—seen and unseen—know we were there. I took it to be a kind of welcoming as well as a friendly protection.  As a member of the Scottish McKenzie Fire Klan on my mother’s side of the family, I liked that idea.  After all, I lit candles in my parents’ basement when I was six years old and stared into the flame, fascinated with the small fire but I think truly I was seeking the fire of spirit. Jesuit philosopher Pierre Teilhard de Chardin once said, “The day will come when, after harnessing space, the winds, the tides and gravitation, we shall harness for God the energies of love. And on that day, for the second time in the history of the world, we shall have discovered fire.”  Perhaps on that Earth Walks we rediscovered those energies as well.

The important thing is not to stop questioning.  Curiosity has its own reason for existing.  One cannot help but be in awe when on contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality.  It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery every day.

 —Albert Einstein

Canyon de Chelly for the First Time

Spider Rock by https://www.josephfiler.com/

May 15, 1992, Canyon de Chelly.  It was my first time to be at the foot of Spider Rock on the canyon floor at the confluence of incredible energies.I was here with friends Ernesto, Doug and Fred and Dinè (Navajo) guide Daniel Staley.

 

Grandmother Spider or Spider Woman is a sacred being that is part of the creation story for many Indigenous people in the American Southwest. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spider_Grandmother (Note that there may not be qualified Indigenous sources for this website article.)  I had a special relationship with the spider that went back to my days in graduate school at the University of Denver in 1971 when I met and fed yogurt to a little spider who visited my basement apartment.  In my personal memoir, I have detailed magical encounters with spiders through the years, including a black widow who worked on her web in the shower stall every time I bathed at my home in Chupadero, north of Santa Fe, NM. For many years I have worn a watch band made by Hopi artist Ross Joseyesva with a spider design that includes what he called the “friendship symbol.” Ross sent me the watch band in the mail before I had paid for it, which I consider an act of friendship and trust, much like that little spider accepting my offering of yogurt before she traveled on.

 

Daniel shared that there are many versions of the creation story, but if there ever is only one, it will mean the end of the world!  Other cultural lessons from Daniel:

  • When gathering plants for use, always select from the east side.
  • Likewise, choose a fire poker stick from east side of plant. The stick when not used is placed on top of house to protect it from burning.
  • The Juniper tree has a beaded pattern from which the early people learned how to make baskets.   Juniper bark was once used for diaper like material and to line infant cradles.

Annie Kahn with a Young Friend

Dinè elder Annie Kahn had given me permission to bring folks to her home, so two days after the Canyon experience, my friends and I sat in her hogan as the full Wesak Moon set and sun rose. We were to record dreams for four nights, then put them away until the new moon, forgetting them until then and retrieving them to see what has transpired.  Annie was a wonderful teacher, healer and storyteller. She shared a dawn prayer song which I have sung daily ever since, no matter where I am:

Hozho Ashado

I walk in Beauty, just for you and only you.

I talk in Beauty, just for you and only you.                                    

I sing of Beauty, just for you and only you.

Annie Kahn Passes (2010)

Annie spoke of the “two spirits” or nadleehi and dilbaa persons born, respectively, as males or females–who U.S. general culture might call “gay.”  This was my “tribe” of people and they were once a family responsible for changes and transitions in life Annie said.  The relatives of this family contain elements of both worlds of up and down, night and day, male and female she added.  Annie used the phrase “twice blessed” to refer to us. https://www.pbs.org/independentlens/documentaries/two-spirits/

We were given some self-care homework to practice at home: Breathe in the sun four times with arms taking in the horizon, allowing it to grow and be alive.  Remember that there must always be a spirit line, a place of surprise and mystery in all of life and listen to the wind, allowing all our senses to be aware.  Dinè people share a story, she said, but not all of it; it is up to each individual to add from their own experience.  Above all, don’t stick to the normal, government inspected and approved path–explore, experiment, touch taste, smell, see hear for yourself.  Let go of shame she advised, and use the parts of yourself that have been forgotten.  Take in “the other” (you define that for yourself) with your left side and balance with the right.

On the day we left, we enjoyed a breakfast meal with tablecloth on the floor.  Cornmeal mush was served in a woven basket, its “spirit line” to the East.  We fed ourselves like children with our hands, not worrying about social etiquette, happily spilling some if we did, and at the same time feeding all other Beings.

Natural History Museum of Utah

Chaco Canyon Calling! June 2023

I

I

The Flute at Sunrise–Chaco Canyon

JUNE 16-18, 2023
(Just a few spaces left–register soon!)
On the mesa at Chaco. You. Native American flute plays as birds sing the day awake. First rays of sunrise warmly greet you.
If you’ve been to Chaco Canyon New Mexico before, you most likely want to return.  If you’ve never been to this profound World Heritage site, this is your opportunity for a wonderful immersive experience.  Chaco is vast, silent and filled with the voices of the Ancestors in ancient Pueblo sites, rock art known as petroglyphs and phenomenal archeoastronomy reflected in its buildings.  Then there are the stars at night!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaco_Culture_National_Historical_Park 
In fact, this will be New Moon when the night sky will especially display her sparkling glory.  We will be in the Canyon close to Summer Solstice, when special features of the ancient buildings receive the first rays of light in a remarkable display of architecture and the natural world.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEoPXMstOxE
Cultural resource guide for  the group will be respected elder and artist Bea Duran of Tesuque Pueblo.  Bea considers Chaco to be ancestral heartland and homeland and her humor and goodwill radiates a warm welcome to all.

Bea Duran of Tesuque Pueblo

Prior to the two night camping trip, the group will meet  with Ehren Kee Natay, a local Indigenous multi-media artist and recognized member of the Dine Nation with Kewa Pueblo, Irish and German ancestry. Deeply connected to his ancestral traditions, Ehren will share his understanding of historical and contemporary Indigenous culture, dispelling myths along the way.     http://www.ehrenkeenatay.com/
His creative work has shown internationally and can be found at two New Mexico Heritage Museums. His current work further infuses his musical craft in Native American flute and drumming with visual aesthetics via live-performance. In his words, “I have a prayer, a spirit, a breath that is inside me.  It tells me to create. It cannot be silenced.  It can only be quiet by creating.”  

It is this spirit and breath that can be found in Chaco Canyon. I hope you will join us in this journey of discovery.

Doug Conwell, Earth Walks

For more details, cost and registration information contact info@earthwalks.org    There is limited space available so be in touch as soon as you can!

Coyote and the Pyramids of Mexico

(This is next in a series of highlights from my Earth Walks experiences over the years.)

Coyote and the Pyramids of Mexico

I traveled to the Great Sand Dunes National Monument in southern Colorado for first time in July 1990.  The tallest dune is 750 high, which is over seven stories. At the visitors’ center I learned about the fate of a coyote who died in a well of the dunes.  He had ventured into one, perhaps chasing a bird or rodent, but could not get out.  Although coyotes are sly and cunning and quite bright creatures, this one did not realize that if he had used the principle of sacred geometry and walked in a spiral direction up the sides of the dunes, he most likely would have escaped. (Watch birds circling upward through wind currents you can see this principle in action.)  Climbing in a straight, linear direction was of no help–obviously. Maybe in his next life Mr. Coyote would know that traveling in a straight path is not always the quickest way to your goal. It’s something I keep relearning in this life myself.

 

His story reminded me of my own years before at Chichen Itza in the Yucatan of Mexico when I had scrambled laboriously up the side to the top of the Mayan Kulkulcan (El Castillo) pyramid.  While I ate my sack lunch, I devoured the words of a Mexican anthropologist whose book I bought at the visitors’ center told of the ancient priests ascending the pyramids in a zig-zag fashion, conducting ceremony on top, then ascending the opposite side in an opposing zig-zag. Putting the two paths together formed a diamond pattern, which was also found on the back of the rattlesnake. The serpent was a central cosmological icon for the Mayas.  In fact, at summer solstice the noon day sun casts shadows down the steps of the pyramid creating the effect of these diamond shapes, ending in the huge stone head of the serpent at the bottom.

I wrote the following about that experience:

The asteroid slams into the ocean creating an immense cataclysmic tsunami. The event profoundly shapes the course of global history over millions of years and forms the Yucatan peninsula of México, a flat, almost  featureless massive limestone shelf carpeted with densely grown selva.  For reasons not completely known, huge pyramids begin rising above the jungle forest, fashioned from the limestone floor.  They are a marvel of architecture, mathematics, astronomy and human endeavor.

I sit high atop one of these, Kulkulcan, at Chichen Itza, watching tourists claw like insects up the 95-foot structure.  They clutch the safety chain on their route, unaware of a mysterious giant serpent just beneath their feet.  Their focus is on cameras, picture taking and conversation.  Mine is on lunch and a little pamphlet that will create a tsunami in my own consciousness. Sandwich in one hand, pamphlet in the other, I read that the classic Mayan culture spanned 2,000 years (1000 BCE-CE 1542). The Mayans devised a calendar system more accurate than the Gregorian calendar of 1582 and their writing skills surpassed all others in the New World. Somehow, they developed the concept of zero.  It was an amazing period of art, scholarship, political and religious fervor.

The pamphlet I read purports that Mayan priests ascended the pyramids with a predetermined zig zag pattern, conducted ceremony, and then descended the opposite side in another diagonal.  The two diagonals juxtaposed formed the diamond design on the rattlesnake, the Kulkulcan deity.  Each of the four stairways on this pyramid has 91 steps, adding up to 364, with the upper platform equaling 365 for the number of days in the year.  Guarding the bottom level is a huge stone serpent head.  During the spring and autumn equinoxes, the sun casts a series of triangular shadows against the northwest balustrade, creating the image of a feathered serpent.

I finish my sandwich and finish the pamphlet. Wanting to do the ancient diagonal walk, I find myself oddly hesitant.  After a deep breath, I step off into the unknown.  First thing noticeable:  My feet perfectly fit the rough, narrow limestone steps as I walk diagonally in the zig-zag pattern.  No safety chain needed.  Then, halfway down, an unexpected encounter: a man dressed in black, carrying a falcon on his arm, ascending the pyramid, also diagonally.  Time seems to stop in the silence.  Our eyes meet in mysterious recognition.  Time begins again and we continue on.  For some reason, I don’t look back to see if the man and falcon are “really there.”  Somehow it doesn’t seem to matter. Later I learn that our encounter was at the level of the pyramid where a jade jaguar statue, symbol of strength and power, had been discovered.

I reach the last step and pause for reflection at the stone carving of Kulkulcan.  Standing next to the statue is a visiting tourist who indifferently crushes out her lit cigarette on the serpent head.  One kind of light goes out, but another has ignited within me to help illuminate the unexpected zig-zag mysteries of life ahead.

(Years later, I dreamed of being a priest on top of the Kulkulcan pyramid at Chichen Itza in Mexico. In it, I was inspired to bring the other priests off the top of the pyramid with me to the people assembled below to do ceremony and prayer with them. I am most certain that I was assassinated for this violation against the hierarchical power structure. Was it a dream, or was it perhaps a past life?)

On my way back home to Santa Fe, NM, I stopped for a visit in Mexico City.  The city’s metro rail system was a marvel of efficiency, cleanliness as well as an educational experience.  In one passageway a magical holographic exhibit with black lights illuminated a journey through the stars.  After emerging into the sunlight above ground, I made my way towards a looming conical shape in the distance, the ultra-contemporary Basilica of Nuestra Senora de Guadalupe, built adjacent to original historic church.

The popular story is that the Virgin Mary appeared to a Nahua man named Juan Diego in December 1531 on Tepeyac Hill, north of Mexico City, where there was a shrine dedicated to the female Aztec earth deity Tonantzin. To this day, in Nahuatl-speaking communities (in other communities as well), the Virgin Mary continues to be called “Tonantzin” and her appearance is commemorated on December 12 each year.

The figurine pictured above from the Mexico City National Museum of Anthropology is  believed to be of Tonantzin, which reportedly means “Our Sacred Mother” in the Nahuatl language. Tonantzin continues to be connected symbolically to fertility and the earth. There are many myths surrounding the Virgin of Guadalupe but she has been recognized by the Catholic church as a manifestation of the Virgin Mary. The Virgin of Guadalupe has become a national symbol of the Mexican nation and she is viewed by many to be a special protector of Native American people.

The Virgin eventually replaced the Aztec Earth Mother goddess Tonantzin in shrines throughout the countryside.  Her image is found throughout the world, especially in the Southwest and New Mexico in many shapes and forms, from tattoos on the back of bikers to pillows and banners.  To me, however, she represents the divine feminine, great mother of the universe.

 

The original as well as the new church sit in sharp contrast to the shocking poverty of the people who beg for a few centavos at its doorstep.  Would La Senora really have wanted all this opulent fuss?  What would Christ have said?

Like other visitors, though, I got on the constantly moving conveyor belt to get a glimpse of the cloth with Mary’s image. I entered the Basilica as a haunting cancion and the mass began and I was on a mission: to light the candle in my hand at the main altar.  With the kind help of a local woman and nun, I received permission from one of the male priests officiating at the altar (of course, no women on the altar, even though this was a temple to honor a woman) to light the candle.  “Not normal,” the priest said in a friendly way, but he did indeed light it from one of the altar candles. (I love breaking taboos!) Shielding it carefully from the breeze, I retraced my steps around the enormous hall, exited “stage left” and placed my candle at a tiny humble shrine outside that was embedded in the hill.

From the oppressive glitter of the Basilica, I trod zig-zag (like the ancient priests did at the pyramid of Kulkulcan at Chichen Itza off the hill to make a private offering to Tonantzin with cornmeal. As the atole rose to each direction in the gentle breeze I felt a mixture of joy, sadness and thanksgiving.

Back in the Metro, I encountered an amazing photographic display that started with an image of human skin, then delved deeper into the microcosmic details to the very quasars and atomic structures as we understand it now.  At one point the skin looked like great canyons and valleys like those of distant planets or the Southwest of the United States.  I was tired from traveling and got disoriented, but a kind Mexican man helped me back in the right direction.  Running late, I arrived at the airport, checked in and walked to the gate precisely as they began to board….I was on my way home.

“Come in and Eat!”

(This is the latest entry about my times and life in New Mexico, and special experiences with the Earth Walks program I co-founded.)

“Come in and Eat!” 

I moved to Santa Fe in December, 1978 but on August 4, 1984 I received  a heartfelt welcome to my new home of New Mexico.  It happened at the Corn Dance ceremony, Santo Domingo Pueblo (now called Kewa in the original Keres language).

Over 500 dancers entered the plaza for the ceremony.  Umbrellas of onlookers sprouted like gaily colored flowers as the morning sun grew stronger along with the power of the drum and chanting.  Heartbeat, soul beat.  A whirlwind spirit moved through the area, stirring up dust and bits of paper borne high above the crowd. The clouds near the Jemez Mountains across the Rio Grande valley seemed to hear the call of the prayers because they arrived to shower us their gifts of a light rain, answering prayers offered by the dancers and drummers.  

A jellybean ant–or so a little boy next to me called him–did his own ceremonial dance on my arm as I sat cross legged on the ground, eye level with the line of dancers.  At that moment, something happened in my awareness.  Drums beat in rhythm, their vibration transmitted up my spine.  I felt a wordless connection with the ceremony that was so foreign, yet so very familiar.

Hunger brought me back to the mundane.  I took my sack lunch out to the ocean of cars in the dusty parking area beyond the dancers and the plaza and found a perch on a concrete parking curb.  Suddenly I heard from behind me a woman’s loud voice:  “What are you doing?”  Uh, oh, I thought.  Was I violating Pueblo rules?  I turned around and there was the woman standing in the doorway of her home looking at me.  “Come in!” she said emphatically and with a broad smile.  “Come in and eat!”  I was being invited into her home to share a meal.  This was one of my first introductions to Pueblo generosity and hospitality.

This generosity has been a part of recorded history, ever since Spanish explorer Coronado was given shelter and food on his failed quest for the gold and riches of the fabled Seven Cities of Cibola.  When they saw Zuni Pueblo shining golden in the sunset, the story goes that they thought they had found the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.  ‘Nothing’ but mud, they pressed on.  What Coronado failed to appreciate was the wealth and richness of the ancient indigenous cultures of the Southwest and their deeply rooted wisdom traditions.  Sitting at the table of my host in her home at Kewa, I tasted this golden heritage and felt honored and blessed.

A humorous side note:  In my earlier “wannabe” days in Santa Fe, I wanted to get a “Pueblo” ribbon shirt like the ones I saw men wearing during feast day ceremonies.  The ones I found were quite expensive.  During a shopping trip at a local western wear store, I found a brightly colored snap button western-style shirt I thought would serve the purpose, at a much more affordable price.  At one of the dances in Kewa Pueblo I attended after that, I noticed an elder in the ceremony who looked like he could be his nineties.  He carried a long ceremonial pole adorned with feathers and flags, moving and dancing with great vigor and concentration. Much to my surprise he was wearing  exactly the  same style shirt that I had bought at the store! It was one more way in which I felt like I had “arrived” in New Mexico.”

Diane Reyna of Taos Pueblo: Reflections on Covid & Other Matters

REFLECTIONS ON COVID AND OTHER MATTERS
Interactive Online Earth Walks
Monday, June 28 2021 6 p.m.
Free or by Donation

Limited Enrollment

From anxiety and stress to inspiring courage and spiritual strength, Diane Reyna, Taos/Ohkay Owinge Pueblo artist, shares a series of drawings that reflect her thoughts on the events and situations that occurred during the COVID-19 lockdown last year.  With pen and paper, hope, faith, and love, Diane created the drawings between March 16, 2020 and March 16, 2021. The ink drawings embody her experience in all its dimensions, including the cultural traditions that helped her navigate the year. She will guide participants through a hands on activity that will offer an avenue for individual insight and possibilities for the future.

Due to the nature of this event, there will be a limited number of participants. Register as soon as possible by contacting:  info@earthwalks.org  There is no charge, but a donation is appreciated. Everyone is welcome!

Diane was raised at her father’s village of Taos Pueblo in Northern New Mexico; her mother was from the Pueblo of Ohkay Owingeh. She is an experienced facilitator, college instructor, and trainer. She retired from the Institute of American Indian Arts in 2015, where she provided comprehensive support and services to first year students. Prior to working at the Institute, she spent 20 years as a videographer, producer, and director in the field of video news and documentary production. She directed the PBS documentary, “Surviving Columbus”, which was awarded the George Foster Peabody in 1993. She has spent most of her adult life in engaged in the arts, education, and facilitation.

Watch Surviving Columbus online
Late one afternoon in May 1539, the world of the Indigenous Pueblo people changed forever when Estebanico – a Black slave from Morocco – and his 300 retinue of Mexican Indians marched into the Zuni city of Hawikuh. Through wild tales and exaggerations, Hawikuh would be transformed into one of the fabled Seven Golden Cities of Cibola, and a year later, Coronado and his soldiers would wreak destruction and violence on this peaceful world in search of non existent gold. Surviving Columbus is a search for the Pueblo people’s view of these first encounters with European civilization, told exclusively through the voices and visions of the Pueblo people themselves..
Due to the nature of this event, there will be a limited number of participants. Register as soon as possible by contacting:  info@earthwalks.org  There is no charge, but a donation is appreciated. Everyone is welcome!

Cultivating a Garden of Peace and Justice

Beata Tsosie-Pena.jpg

Free online event Thursday, May 20, 2021  5 p.m.

How do a people who have endured generations of oppression survive?  It’s a question Beata Tsosie-Pena of Santa Clara Pueblo and El Rito is often asked.

Historical trauma and inequities and living in the shadow of a nuclear production facility motivated Beata to work in environmental health and justice with the non-profit Tewa Women United program for over a decade.

“These the are things our people have faced. But that doesn’t negate our strength and power,” Beata said.  “We are resilient.”  Her activist concerns led her to become a full-spectrum doula and breastfeeding support counselor as well as infant massage specialist. Even her poetry reflects a deep commitment to the land and its people and is evidenced in the Healing Foods Oasis Garden which she coordinates.  The Garden is a project of TWU and the City of Espanola.

Resiliency—that’s at the heart of the many stories that are lived and shared at the Garden.  On Thursday, May 20 at 5 p.m., Beata will conduct a free public online storytelling and dialogue which will highlight the collaboration between art, science and indigenous wisdom.  It’s a collaboration that offers a model of sustainability critical in this Anthropocene era of climate change, she believes.

(To register, contact:  earthwalks1@yahoo.com)                     New Mexico's Community Garden Revolution

The Garden is both a symbol of the traditional Tewa Pueblo values of place and the teachings of water and a grassroots act of prayer, ceremony, song—as well as resistance and survival.  “It’s about building the beloved community,” she says.  For her, that community is both local and global.

Heirloom seeds hand-harvested at the Garden are donated to the Espanola Public Library next door and available to the public. Seeds are kept in a refurbished card catalog cabinet. After picking which types to grow, patrons fill out a “seed caregiver sign-up” form and become part of a growing cadre of those planting and caring for heirloom plants.

Children participating are taught how to use the library and learn about local farming practices.  It’s ecological literacy, what Beata calls “voices of the plant elders and relatives.”

The online presentation will be followed by a series of volunteer days at the garden for those who wish to help.

The event is being sponsored by Earth Walks, a cross cultural education program based in Santa Fe, New Mexico, original homeland of the Tewa Pueblo indigenous people.    https://earthwalks.org/   To register, contact earthwalks1@yahoo.com

                                     Environmental Health and Justice Program | Tewa Women United

 

Pueblo Culture and tradition–a Unique Opportunity

Helping clear the fields and gardens

 

 

 

EARTH WALKS TO JEMEZ PUEBLO, NEW MEXICO   June 20-22, 2019

Join hearts and hands at Jemez Pueblo with the Flower Hill Institute farm, tending the land, planting heritage seeds and experiencing traditional cultural values, sponsored by Earth Walks of Santa Fe, New Mexico.  We will be joined by the summer Pueblo youth camp, elders and other community members.

Roger Fragua, director of the Institute farm said, “Farming with nature (the root of organic farming) lies at the heart of practices used by native farmers in the Southwest for millennia. Traditional cultural farming can teach us a great deal about how to build a resilient and regenerative agriculture.” A children’s butterfly pollination dance will celebrate the fields.

A special part of the gathering will be with Abbess Hosen guiding the group in the practice of mindfulness in action as we assist in the beautiful organic gardens at the Zen Center.  Meditations in the zendo are an option as well. Lodging is dormitory style at Bodhi Manda Zen Center where there are relaxing hot springs alongside the Jemez River. 

Cost:  $375 (two nights lodging and meals)  A limited number of private rooms are available at additional cost.     Volunteer for one both days only at no cost except for meals. 

 Registration/information:  info@earthwalks.org  

Chaco Canyon, New Mexico Archaeoastonomy

(Join the Earth Walks program in a three day journey to Chaco Canyon October 6-8, 2018 camping under the stars, guided by a New Mexico Pueblo family who consider the site as their ancestral homeland.  For information on cost and registration: https://earthwalks.org/ )

Pueblo Bonito Kiva and Complex at Chaco

At an elevation of 6,200 feet, Chaco is a high desert, sun-scorched in the summer and bitterly cold in the winter. Despite these harsh conditions, evidence of human presence in the area stretches back to as early as 2900 BC. These groups were largely nomadic, until around AD 200, when the first farmers settled in the area and built small pit houses.

Then in roughly AD 850, a great change took place. The people began building in a radically different manner, constructing massive stone buildings unlike any that had been built before. These structures soared to four or five stories and contained up to seven hundred rooms and dozens of mostly circular underground ceremonial rooms.

The architecture was a feat of engineering, often built along celestial alignments, they included water-collection systems and were linked to outlying communities by an extensive network of roads. These elaborate buildings evidence a sophisticated and highly organized culture, with Chaco Canyon at its center.

Full moon over the Canyon

The people of Chaco demonstrated extraordinary observations of astronomical phenomena which they incorporated into their buildings by designing, orienting and locating their major buildings in relationship to solar and lunar events.  This required advanced architectural and design skills, scientific observation and social cohesion.  Some think the civilization that flourished here parallels that of Aztec, Mayan and Inca cultures.

New Mexico Pueblo Prayers

It was August 4th, 2018 and I was at Kewa (Santo Domingo Pueblo) south of Santa Fe, New Mexico to attend the annual Corn Dance Ceremony and Dances.  Really more like a prayerful event, in which hundreds of dancers of all ages participate from the village.  As I made my way through the maze of walkways into the central plaza area, I ended up walking next to a group of dancers who were headed in the same direction.  Not wanting to disturb their focus, I was silent.  Then one of them called to me:  “How are you doing today?”  That opened up a friendly conversation.  They were all teachers at the Santa Fe Indian School and I had worked in the Santa Fe Public Schools for many years.  It felt like a blessing and honor to be in conversation.

I shared with them an experience I had almost 40 years ago when I had attended the dances for the first time.  Taking a break, I took my sack lunch out to the parking area in an ocean of trucks and cars.  I found a concrete curb to sit on and began to eat.  Then from behind me somewhere a woman’s voice yelled at me:  “What are you doing?!”  Uh-oh.  I thought perhaps I’d violated some Pueblo rules or etiquette.  I turned around to see the woman standing in the doorway of her home, adorned with a kitchen apron and waving at me.  “Come in!  Come in and eat!”  And so I did, with strangers who felt like family.  That was my introduction to Pueblo generosity and friendship.

Helping Harvest Corn

Santo Domingo Pueblo, on the east bank of the Rio Grande about 40 miles north of Albuquerque, is the scene each August 4th of the largest Indian dance ceremonial held annually in the southwest. This is the feast day of St. Dominic, patron saint of the historic Indian Pueblo, and more than 1,000 Santo Domingo Indians join a presentation of the colorful Green Corn Dance.

Men, women and children, all in beautiful ceremonial attire, dance under the sun in the big plaza of the old historic pueblo to the sound of chanting and pounding drums. The Green Corn Dance at Santo Domingo Pueblo each August 4th attracts thousands of spectators from all parts of New Mexico and even from the far corners of the world.

Feast Day activities begin with a morning mass in the picturesque mission church at the east edge of the Pueblo. After mass, a statue of St. Dominic is carried in a procession from the Church to a place of honor in a bough covered shrine on the pueblo plaza. Here, St. Dominic will remain until the ceremonial dance is completed. Then it will be returned to the Church.

The Green Corn Dance begins in front of the Church by 10 am and will continue throughout the day. Members of the Squash and Turquoise clans will alternate in the dancing. Pueblo Indian potters and silversmiths will display their wares for sale on the tables and on the grounds in the Pueblo and food concessions and carnival rides will be set up. Since this is a religious observance, no photography, sketching, or tape recording will be permitted. No alcohol beverages/illegal drugs or contraband are allowed on the Pueblo.

As I drove away from the Pueblo, a huge cloud had begun to form over the Jemez Mountains to the East.  Looking back it seemed to be like a giant feather stretched over the wide New Mexico sky, spreading its blessings of coming rain over the Pueblo and dancers.  Ah-ho!

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