January 31, 2010

We've had an interesting time for the past two days, for different reasons, though.

Friday we were in Ganado, AZ at the Hubbell Trading Post National Historic Site. Budd was there for work, and I tagged along so we could go shopping in Gallup for some things we have been sorely missing. More about that later.

I had told Budd a couple of days before that the low tire light was on, and he had said it wasn't very low and not to worry about it. So Friday morning found us looking all over town for compressed air to fill it up for the trip. Discovered there are actually four gas stations in town...none of which have compressed air. I kept saying 'Fix-a-Flat', and Budd kept saying that the tire repair guys hate that because it makes a mess they have to deal with when repairing the tire. But finally it was the only choice, especially when Budd found the cause, a fence staple, still stuck in the tire. We made the 34-mile drive holding our breath that it didn't get thrown out or forced out by the goop.

Hubbell is not only a national historic site, it is still an active trading post, given to the Park Service by the widow of the youngest son of the original Hubbell. Indian artisans for many miles bring their rugs, jewelry, baskets and other artwork to be sold here, and the store sells them everything from potato chips to STP oil treatment. The Park Service also preserves the Hubbell home, and keeps a herd of the Churro sheep that have provided meat and wool for the Navajo tribe since the Long Walk survivors were allowed to leave Ft. Sumnter and return home in 1868. The visitor's center boasts a rug weaving demonstration and a visitor's loom, where I tried my hand at weaving a few rows. I decided to stick to cross-stitch and crochet.

Before I got to learn or see anything except the trading post, I asked one of the interps (Park Service employees who are there to help answer visitor questions, lead tours, etc.--official name interpretors) whether there was a place in town to get my tire fixed. He told me where, and I set off to get that done before the next leg of the journey. When I found the place, I had to laugh. It was housed in a construction-trailer type building, and there was no pavement, just a sea of slushy snow. Inside, I found a very friendly Navajo woman who told me it would be about a 30-minute wait. I passed that time watching a huge tv that took up over half her sales counter. I didn't know the second Transformers movie was so funny! I never did learn the name of my hostess, but she told me that if I saw a rug-weaver named Ruby at Hubbell, I should say hi. She said Ruby was her cousin. Then she said Ruby was her sister, and that their mothers had been sisters, 'that's how close we are.' I thought that was a little odd, so later I asked the interp at the visitor's center about Navajo relationships. It's a bit complicated, so I'll say more about it in another day's post, but 'sister' was correct, because of the clan relationship. Navajos are a matriarchal society.

Back at Hubbell, I found Ruby, who is in fact the rug-weaver at the demonstration loom. She looked a little confused when I told her I met her cousin. This was before I learned about the correct terms. I sat cross-legged on the floor and watched her work after trying the guest loom. She made it look much easier. After lunch, I took a tour of the Hubbell home, which I'll also talk about more later. When I returned to the visitor center, Ruby was at lunch, so I conversed with the lunch-hour substitute interp. He turned out to be a college student, and had asked me what I do after learning why I was there. When I told him I tutor online, he pulled a paperback out of his pocket, Hermann Melville's Moby Dick, and asked me what he should be paying attention to.

Later, Paul, the regular interp came back and talked about Navajo relationships, why the young people aren't learning to speak Navajo, and how the old ways are being less and less practiced nowadays. He didn't seem as sad about this as I was. When I think about it, though, I guess we Anglos don't practice the same traditions from 100 years ago or more, either. At least not in the same ways.

I learned quite a bit while there at Hubbell, and haven't even touched below the surface, but this is getting long, and there will be days in the future when nothing much of interest is happening when I can write about Navajo culture and history.

When Budd was finished with what he went to do, we drove on to Gallup, where the first thing we did was hit Walmart and obtain a prepaid debit card with which to rejoin the 21st century. Now I could pay my phone bill, storage bill, and the fee for Mvelopes so life would be back to normal. A late dinner that turned out to be a mistake came next, and then we returned to 'our' hotel, a reasonably-priced, fairly comfortable, place on historic Route 66 where we stayed the previous trip.

The next morning, we made ready for the big shopping trip, grabbed breakfast at the first place we saw, and then headed out looking for a printer cartridge to fit our printer. As we went from place to place (having already looked at Walmart on our last trip), I began to feel, shall we say, some discomfort. The rest of the day was lost to food poisoning. If you've never shopped at Walmart in a market town on a Saturday with the need to find the bathroom every half hour, my recommendation is, don't.

As a result, I'm not sure we got everything we went for, but I am sitting on a more comfortable pillow on this very uncomfortable chair, and the tv now has the capability to record one show while watching a different one--a necessity of life once you have tasted the luxury. Unfortunately, I didn't feel well enough to go to the neighbor's house for the dinner we had been invited to Saturday night. We felt really awful about that, as we didn't have their phone number and didn't return in time to give them a heads-up that we couldn't be there. Budd stopped on the way to our place and let them know I was sick, then got us home and the car unloaded, including me.

We watched Friday night's Jazz game that Budd had set to record--go Jazz! Beat the Kings without either of our star players, and it was fun to watch the tributes to Hot Rod Hundley, Jazz radio and tv announcer for years, on the occasion of his retirement.

Now I'm all caught up, hungry as a bear after not eating for 24 hours, and facing putting away everything that just got thrown wherever it landed last night. Guess I'll start with breakfast, and cross my fingers.