This morning finds us with no cell phone signal but we’ll call when we have one again.
We’re camped at the Navajo National Monument in northern Arizona. We’re in the middle of the Navajo reservation so not a lot of services and one of our trailer tires picked up a screw and is leaking air. We discovered the leak while trying to fuel up at a station that turned out to be closed due to a power outage. The UPS driver who was trying to make a delivery to them told us about a guy down the road to the Monument that fixes tires. Reluctant to take the trailer down an unknown dirt drive in the middle of a reservation, we drove to the campground, unhitched and went back. The driveway turned out to be about 3/4 of a mile long through beautiful and strange (to my eyes) terrain, ending at a home with multiple dogs laying outside. We sat in the truck until a man came out of the house and then told him of our need for tire repair. A man of few words (at least with us), he asked if we wanted him to come to the campground to fix the tire. We took this generous offer to be a polite negotiation and countered with an offer to bring the trailer back to him in the morning. That’s the current plan and it will be an adventure in its own right.
Happy Birthday, Mom. I hope you have a wonderful day!
You two can get into funny situations. It does
sound like an adventure. Let us know soon how
it went this morning. I had a great day! Steve
got his yard cleaned up and we had fun with girls
doing it. Jill and Shelly planted the flowers in
their swans out front and some others around the
porch so it looks great. They also repainted their swans that are made of cement – they came
with the house seven years ago. They have lots
of flowers coming up along garage, and garden has
lots of herbs, strawberries, rhubard, and a couple berry bushes. The peach tree they chose
and planted last year is blooming. Maybe they
will have peaches. love you both
The rest of the story …
The Visitor Center staff gave us a message from “the man who is supposed to fix your tire” saying that he had gone into Kayenta and would come to the campground in the afternoon. We went for a walk (to an overlook of some amazing Anasazi ruins) and debated whether to wait for him or just to put on the spare and get the tire fixed somewhere else. Steve creatively figured out a way to jack up the trailer (having discovered our truck jack isn’t adequate for this purpose) by rolling the other tire up on as many wood blocks as we could (it worked great), and ultimately, after much discussion and mental process, we decided to stick with the plan to have the Navajo man fix our tire, if still possible. In the meantime, the park staff came and said that the message was actually that the man would be back from Kayenta by 9:30 am. Sigh…
He was home when we got there and not only did our tire get repaired but we learned a bit about him and got a tour of his ceremonial hogan. We don’t know his name. He didn’t offer one so we didn’t ask. He is 52 years old and is trying to get medical retirement from the coal mine job he held for the last 29 and a half years, due to a malignant tumor in his neck. He encouraged us to hike up to a hilltop behind his house where we would have a great view of the area (which we unfortunately didn’t feel we could do with the dogs in the car and the day getting on) and he explained how he built his hogan and how they use it for curing ceremonies; how it stays cool in the summer and warm in the winter (it is the traditional circular kind built of hand-hewn logs and covered with earth.) He was obviously very proud of it and was in process on a second one. He pointed out downed trees that had come down in a tornado a few years ago and told us that he would not use that wood because then people using the hogan would become sick.
We also learned that though the land he lives on was free to him (his wife’s ancestors lived nearby), he paid $10,000 to get electricity brought in (solar would have seemed a better option!) and he hauls water in a tank on his truck from a treated source at the mine, to fill another tank on his property which supplies the house.
In so many ways our lives are different. In others they are the same. He has five dogs, a horse and chickens. And his neighbors sued him to try to stop him from completing his hogan. “Why”, I asked. He just shrugged and said “I guess they didn’t want me to build it.” He went to court and apparently won. The hogan is complete.
Trivia tidbit for the day: The Navajo Nation observes daylight savings time along with Utah and Colorado. The Hopi Reservation, which is completely encircled by the Navajo Reservation, does not observe daylight savings time, along with the rest of Arizona. Makes it very confusing to know what time it is!