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As we drove out to Kathy’s new house we were all struck by the distance and isolation. From the mission to St. Mary’s was over an hour. It took forty five minutes to get back to the new house, which was another thirty minutes from the mission. Not only were the vast distances new to many of us, so was the solitude. Each one of these places was miles and miles from any hospital or developed community. Kathy was elderly and in poor health. She suffered from the ongoing impacts of diabetes and her legs in particular didn’t work very well. For many of us when our grandparents or parents begin to suffer like this it makes sense to bring them closer to medical care, and closer to community; so we were confounded as we pulled down the long sand drive and opened the makeshift gate put in place to protect Kathy’s beloved sheep, should they ever make it to this house. With no running water or electricity, as she had been denied it by the government up to this point, Kathy would be on a high risk island in our estimation.

But as we unpacked the trailer and asked her why she chose this place for the University of Utah students to build her highly sustainable little house, she explained that this plateau was sacred land to her family. She pointed to a little cluster of houses and sheds miles away and said that those were her people. She clearly felt a peace and security that she did not have at the trailer at St.Mary’s. It is hard to consider what sacred land is for many of us. A special beach or river that has served as a summer retreat? A grandparent’s house with all the nostalgic smells and sights? Most of us do not have sacred land that has been with our people for thousands of years-it is hard to fathom what that could mean, and what that land holds for Kathy and for her people. As we spent the next couple of days unpacking Kathy’s many belongings, a picture of a woman coming home developed. Kathy was not as concerned with her health, or with living as long as she possibly could. She was completing her basket and circling back to where she started, with her people, and on her sacred land. 

This theme of returning to your people is central to the Diné tradition. In fact, Kathy talked about one of the resounding themes of their childhood during that lunch in the Hogan, which is the importance of venerating the elders. Taken a step further this means caring for and staying close to those who have come before you, dead or alive. Kathy and Walter told us that they worry that the hard life of the reservation has driven many of the young folk away, resulting in the abandonment of the elders and the traditional ways of folding one generation into the next. Kathy referenced her own disability and how she needs to lean on our “tall one” as she gets in and out of the truck. She was not just speaking in terms of bodily ability but of a mental and emotional vulnerability that comes with aging, as well as the wisdom that the elders offer the young-should they remember to listen. She fears that we have lost this valuable relationship and that it will permanently change the human community. So she urged us to stay close to and care for our elders. 

Those days spent with Kathy and Walter, as busy as they were, forced us all to slow down and listen. We could not pick up our phones, or turn on the tv, or get in our car and drive away. It was as though we were on another planet, (which the landscape reiterated) and time and space were different than in our own day to day living. But it was because time and space were so different that we could hear their words, see their sacred land, be awake to their lessons and to the Spirit at work in them and in us, and hopefully we were changed forever.