She Was From Shiprock-Nataani Nez

She was from Shiprock

Sometimes you can be at work or somewhere and a certain song comes on
and this is what I thought about when one started to play on the radio
and it reminded me of something, a story about a boy and his girl.


She was from Shiprock on the Navajo Reservation. Her mother worked at
the hospital there and she lived not too far from the hospital. It was
during a time of many changes and she was going to go to school up
North, a small place in Utah to live with a foster family.


Her boyfriend was from somewhere near Burnham, not too far from the
old school there, just to the East and he was going back the Ignacio
boarding school up by Durango. They were young.


It was during a Summer Sing which is three nights long, each night in
a different place; the Second Night near Teec Nos Pos which means
Circle of Trees in the Navajo way of speaking.


It was here that they met. He had gone to visit a cousin who said
let’s go over there and get something to eat. He was sitting on
the hood of a truck when a young Navajo girl came up to him. She was
dressed in red velvet, her shirt and skirt were soft, and she had on
an old time silver concho belt, with a red coral bead necklace. She
was wrapped in a Pendleton blanket with fringes. She walked up to him
and touched him with her fringes and that was all it took. He had to
go out into the clearing and they danced in the way of the their
people. Her hair was tied up in a bun with white yarn to hold it in
place. She grabbed his arm and shirt and they danced.


The singers were good that night, the stars were bright in the night
sky and the smell of cedar smoke was thick in the air. The sound of
the drum gave them rhythm and they danced well together. She was shy
and did not say much. She was from the Towering House People and he
was from the Coyote Pass People and they made a good match.


She took him to a small rise and they talked until dawn. She was from
there originally she said, and pointed to a place to the South, the
base of a ridge she called home. She stayed with her mother in
Shiprock and would be leaving to school in the Fall. It was their
first night of a long summer.


He lived way out on the flat and they would get together when they
chanced to see each other. It seemed when anyone around the community
needed a driver to take someone to the hospital he would be there. He
got to know this quiet shy girl and they talked about where they
wanted to go, the places they would visit and what they wanted to be.
Her eyes sparkled; they were dark and the seemed to smile on their
own. He knew her by the way she walked, and the laughter of her voice.


They had no money, but they had time and her mother had an old truck.
They spent a summer day going to the Navajo Car wash by Little Water;
it was a well with a pipe coming out of the ground where people could
fill their water barrels. They parked underneath and let the water
fall all over the truck and them, washing it and getting all wet on a
hot day.


There was a Sing near Newcomb and they met there and helped out. He
went up on the mountain and she went with him, and she chopped wood
along side him and they loaded it up. The cedar left a sweet smell on
them.


She slept on the way back on the seat next to him. Her skin was brown
and smooth. Her eyes were closed. She looked rough and delicate at the
same time. Her cheekbones were high. What a sight she made her face
was dirty just like his and her hair was sticking out here and there
but still looked good lying there. They rode on down the mountain and
the Second Night place was ready.


Cleaning themselves up they saw the horse riders coming over the hill
and a group from this camp met them and brought the a stick covered
with yarn back to the Second Night ceremony.
It was a warm evening, and the shade house was full of Navajo people
from all around. Cars and trucks were parked here and there and people
gathered, visited and prepared for the singing and dancing all night.


The singing began. Her family was there, her grandmother and mother
and they worked to feed all who came. As the night went on, the hogan
where the Sing was being done was busy; a medicineman and his helpers
moved about. Outside the singers began to sing the songs of
restoration, of life and of traveling songs with horses.


A little ways off, not too far from there were red rock ledges around
a small reservoir. She brought him to an overhang later that night and
they talked about the things of summer. They stretched out on a
blanket and she layed her head against his chest and they looked at
the stars…


“Where to you think we will be someday, maybe when we are old?
Will we still be here?” she said.


“I think we will always be here…no matter where we go.
Don’t you know that?”


“Ah, you’re just saying that, you liar,” she said
teasingly.


“Tah Ahnee, (No, really it’s true) this is our spot and
it’s ours, no one can claim it.” The sandstone was soft
and warm, the night was quiet and the glow from the bonfires at the
Sing lit up the night sky.


She looked at him and said, “Where do you think we will go from
here…I am leaving tomorrow you know”.


“I know. I won’t be going back to Ignacio dorm till next
week>


It was quiet for a long time, as they layed next to each other. The
stars were shining; all of them, there were so many up there.


Do you remember the story about how the Maii (the Coyote, the
trickster) came? He grabbed the blanket when the Holy People tried to
arrange them on a rug. and that crazy Maii (Coyote) grabbed the corner
of it and threw them up in any old way?


“Yes, I remember it, why?”


“I know where it happened.”


She looked at him and said, “Eeyohcheed, (You Liar), Where
then?” in a teasing way she said it.


“Just over there, he pointed to the East across the water with
his lips without moving his head”


She sat up and looked that way. “Haahdi’ shuh? (Where?),
she said.


Nloyahdii’ Kin se’uh, (Just over there by those
ruins)”, he said.


She poked him with her elbow and she said, “You’re no
good”, and they laughed.


There talked about the night sky, about what they hoped for and about
their future when they got back. After a little while it got quiet and
she just layed there next to him, Her eyes just a few inches from his
and they were so clear and bright. They were not like any he had seen
anywhere before. She just looked at him for the longest time. Her hair
was a black as the night, long and dark. She smelled like cedar wood
and she was something so real, and yet so unknown to him he
didn’t know what to say.


He reached out and held her, and felt the strength in her back, as she
layed next to him. There comes a time when the person you care about
means everything to you, and at times like this talking is
meaningless. A gentle touch and just being close is speaking without
words. A glance, a touch and comfort of each other is something that
you learn to value as time goes by. It was like this that night. He
kissed her nice and slow and they held each other for the longest
time. The watched the early light of dawn chase the stars away. They
talked quietly speaking of Dawn Boy and standing there meeting the Sun
as it turned the world to blue, pink and then gold. It was then that
they walked back to the Sing where the embers of the bonfires had
burned themselves out.


It was the last time he saw her, she went away and never came back to
him. In the melody and words of an old song that plays on the radio; a
song heard when they washed the truck at the Navajo car wash. It
reminded me of this story, of a place where time stands still for an
eternity. It was just a boy and his girl from the Navajo rez and time
when they spent a night under the stats. So it goes sometimes with old
songs on the radio.

rustywire