JENNIFER SAT AT HER DESK, her tailbone aching from sitting in her chair all day. She moved her head side to side slowly stretching her neck. She yawned and reached for her cup of coffee, but as she wrapped her fingers around the mug she felt how cold it was. She sighed, looked at her wristwatch, and put her fingers back on the keyboard.
This was her last note of the day. She had sat through eight clients today. Seven of them were regulars but her last was a new client referred to Jennifer from his probation officer. She looked over the letter sent with the client from the probation department.
“Mr Trujillo is required to attend ten counselling sessions with a focus on skills development and substance abuse. One missed session will result in immediate arrest and incarceration.
“Mr Trujillo’s counsellor will be required to send in a final report at the end of ten sessions with an assessment of the client’s participation, progress, and skills development.”
Jennifer typed in a short note about her first session with him. She typed quickly and succinctly with the words of her supervisor in her mind: “Remember to note sessions with the knowledge that it might end up in court one day. You don’t want to tell too much or too little—just enough to remind you of what you worked on together. Keep it vague.”
“Client presents with complex trauma symptoms attributed to childhood abuse in foster care system, current substance abuse, street involvement, and is currently unemployed. Writer used Assessment Form 103-B to assess client. Writer is building rapport and trust with client and will continue to do so. Client’s next session is next Friday at 4:00 p.m. Writer will finish filling out Assessment Form 103-B.”
She was able to leave thirty minutes after five, enough time to run an errand before making it home for the night.
K’É SAT AT *THEIR KITCHEN TABLE sipping on *their juniper tea and eating pinches of cornbread *they had baked that morning. The clean pine flavour mixed well with the sweet cornbread. K’é sat in front of the window facing west in *their hogan, an octagonal home with a twenty-five-foot radius. *They lived alone in a hogan built to maximize space in *their solitude and thoughts. A hanging wood-burning stove to warm the cold desert nights. A doorway facing east to greet the sunrise. A bookcase filled with books and plants. A small couch and coffee table to write *their daily journal. A small kitchen table to sit at and prepare for *their next session with *their mentor, Asdzáá Hashké.
Asdzáá Hashké was a firm but loving teacher. Her voice could be heard clearly over a good distance with its booming high tone. Her chastising was as loud and expressive as her warmth and care.
“Yadilah!” she would exclaim loudly when she was exasperated with her students, jarring the classroom.
“Yáah, shiawéé!” she would say when she was proud of her students, soothing them all with her quiet smile.
In their last session together, however, Asdzáá Hashké’s teachings were more alarming and urgent. K’é knew Asdzáá Hashké was part of the second generation who survived near extinction during the last World War. But sitting on the floor of Asdzáá Hashké’s hogan, she finally described her experiences in detail.
Asdzáá Hashké searched K’é’s face ensuring there was a place within *them to place each and every one of her words. “During the last World War, our Navajo ancestors hid deep inside the cliff walls of the reservation and in underground bunkers to escape the draft. Those who were forced to fight tried to make their way back home to ensure the safety of their families. Very few returned. They were captured at checkpoints, jailed, or placed back at the front lines. The war raged on and we survived invasions from China and Russia. Larger cities and towns already debilitated by economic depression and climate change were captured first, but rural areas took longer to canvass and control. Beyond the safety of our canyons, the rich died at the hands of rebel forces, crops failed, and mass extinction became a daily reality. It was complete chaos.”
Rivers of tears filled Asdzáá Hashké’s eyes as she described how, despite bombs dropped, despite millions killed, despite the chaos of this new world, soldiers returned home because of dreams they had had.
“I was at my post and drifted off,” Asdzáá Hashké remembered as this soldier spoke many years ago. “They had us standing guard for twelve to sixteen hours at a time. The air was electric with fear. I dreamt that my grandma, speaking from Spirit world as she had passed years before, sat in front of me. I could reach out and touch her. Before she faded away, she told me, ‘Go home. This is not the fight we need you for. Your family needs you.’”
And finally, “An auntie visited me in my dreams. She said to me, ‘Our people will not survive. Our ways and traditions will not make it if you are not home to learn.’ She showed me images on the surface of her palm of what was going to happen. It was so terrifying at first and I couldn’t watch. Then she opened her other palm and showed me images of survivors, my children and grandchildren and their grandchildren. I left my post and hitchhiked all the way home.”
Asdzáá Hashké sighed heavily and braced herself on K’é’s shoulder as if the memory had been too much. “K’é. Look at me. I am old now. I have to reserve my energy for Travelling between worlds. This requires long hours and a lot of rest. I cannot do this alone. I have a strong feeling in my belly that you have been Travelling already.” K’é gulped at the offer, as if standing at the edge of a great precipice.
Now in K’é’s hogan, *they took a deep breath and finished writing in *their journal *their truth, as if signing a contract to *their heart, to the future of *their people: “It is time to tell Asdzáá Hashké my dream.” Before K’é could change *their mind, *they packed some cornbread and headed to Adszáá Hashké’s home.
EVERY MINUTE JENNIFER SPENT at work led up to this moment when she would come into her favourite corner store, Lucky Convenience. Jennifer stepped in through the sliding automatic doors and scanned the aisles quickly.
“We meet again,” she whispered under her breath.
She knew the anatomy of this store like the back of her hand. Each aisle from front to back was assigned various items starting with automotive and seasonal supplies. Next aisle belonged to travel-size toothpaste, single-serve aspirin, and emergency sewing kits. The aisle after that was dedicated to chips, candy, and gum, followed by baked goods. A coffee stand with doughnuts stood before the refrigerated section of sodas, juices, milk, eggs, butter, beer, and wine.
Jennifer learned which beer had the highest alcohol content as well as the cheapest wine. Reds over whites.
The hot dogs turned on the hot iron rods. The Slurpee machine mixed reds and blues. The smell of diluted coffee wafted through the air. She needed a six-pack of beer and a bottle of wine. She weaved between other shoppers swiftly, made it to the cooler, and grabbed her favourite brand of dark ale: Newcastle. She held the beer close to her as she made her way to the wines on sale a couple of aisles down. She adjusted her bag on her shoulder, freed her hand, and reached up for a bottle of red wine. She made her way to the front and stood in line with her items.
The cool bottles of beer and warm wine bottle pressed against her like a familiar weight to her arms and hips. This part—the relentless lineup—felt like the last hurdle before she was to head home and settle in for the night. She imagined the sweet aftertaste of the Newcastle as she waited for her turn. This made her salivate and stomach knot up. A white woman in a pantsuit stepped up with her items and fumbled with her payment. As the cashier rang her up, Jennifer tapped the wine bottle with a finger, impatient that it was taking this long for her to get home with her drinks. She wanted nothing more than to check out and to forget about her day.
While Pantsuit Lady desperately scooped change that had fallen to the floor, Jennifer’s thoughts wandered back to her meeting with her last client. She didn’t like court-ordered sessions, not because of the clients, but because it was coercive in nature. Judges didn’t really care about healing. They wanted reports to move this client along either back into jail, or, if they were feeling charitable, they would track them into a rehabilitation centre.
Jennifer forced a smile as the client entered the room. “Welcome to my office. I’m looking forward to working with you.”
“Me too.” He tried not to sound too enthusiastic, but she had the power to send him to jail, so he played nice. He smiled with his chapped lips but his dark brown eyes remained suspicious. His wiry facial stubble framed his mouth and faded down his chin. Classic patchy Native beard pattern. Jennifer reminded herself to give him an outreach hygiene kit which had a razor, travel-size shaving cream, toothbrush, toothpaste, and underarm deodorant. His thin frame was engulfed by the chair he sat in. He wore fitted jeans, a canvas belt buckle from the Army surplus store on Valencia Street, a black T-shirt three sizes too big, and an old pair of red-and-white Jordans with shoelaces he had knotted where the lace had come apart. Jennifer watched him as he carefully scanned the room. A diploma. A large black filing cabinet. The computer turned away from him. A poster of the Seven Sacred Teachings. An abalone shell with a bundle of sage sticking out of it. The usual books about addiction and trauma. A cup of cold coffee in a brightly coloured Pendleton mug.
“Would you like some water or a snack?”
“Sure.”
She handed him a granola bar from a box she had in her bottom desk drawer and a bottle of water.
“I keep some for clients in case they’re hungry.”
He opened the bottle of water and granola bar. The bar was gone in two bites. He washed it down with half the water in one gulp.
“I like granola bars too,” she said. “Especially the ones with chocolate.”
“It’s all right. Thanks. So, what do we do now?”
“Well, we will work on an intake. It’s a lot of questions, some of them can be difficult to answer. You can take your time or not answer any of them. Your choice. Cool?”
“Cool.” They both knew he didn’t have a choice. He had rehearsed this story so many times. He knew how to share without feeling any of it. No one really cared anyway. He wanted to stay out of jail and she was just meeting with another client.
“Okay, next.” The cashier waved in Jennifer’s direction. Jennifer shook her head and placed her purchases onto the conveyor belt, the image of the client’s patchy beard still fresh in her mind.
K’É COULD SEE ASDZÁÁ HASHKÉ’S new hogan sitting in the desert’s late afternoon sunlight. As *they approached her front gate *they noticed a small garden of corn, squash, and watermelon. K’é said a silent prayer over the seedlings in the hope that the soil would sustain the crop, twenty years after the war’s destruction. K’é marvelled at the hogan’s construction and rejoiced in Asdzáá Hashké finally living above ground. Many of her generation were finally emerging onto the landscape after two decades of surviving in connected networks of underground bunkers.
K’é could see through the front window that Asdzáá Hashké was waiting inside drinking tea. K’é knocked on the door.
“Shimá, you home?”
“Aoo’, come inside.”
K’é turned the metal doorknob, pushed the wooden door, and entered. Asdzáá Hashké was seated at her round kitchen table. The rich brown of the table had faded and there were four mismatched chairs around the table. She sat in the most comfortable one, wide with chrome finish and faded blue cloth cushion and back. There was an extra pillow on the seat. Beneath her to the left of her chair on the clay tile were grooves etched out from her whorl that danced and jumped against her leg when she spun wool. Her balls and skein of yarn sat in a basket on the small sofa behind her chair. K’é sat on the metal crate closest to her. Asdzáá Hashké poured tea from a metal kettle into two matching cups. K’é enjoyed the momentary silence as *they gathered *their energy and attention. As *they sat sipping from *their tea, Asdzáá Hashké finally spoke. K’é knew better than to speak before *their elder.
“You’ve learned a lot these past few years, yáázh. I’m proud of your progress. But part of progressing is owning your truth. Do you have something important to share with me today?” Asdzáá Hashké peered into the depths of K’é’s face in a way that only a nádleeh or Medicine Person could. K’é gulped, unsure if *they were brave enough to carry on these traditions.
“Sometimes, I dream. Sometimes, I swim with whales and dolphins. Other times, I am learning to fly. At first it’s this awkward frog-legged movement that gets me a few feet into the air but soon I can frog-leg myself above the trees and see everything below me.” K’é paused for a moment and looked at Asdzáá Hashké, wondering if *they sounded silly. Asdzáá Hashké nodded, encouraging the truth to come forth, knowing not all had been said.
“Now the dreams are getting stronger. More vivid. Last night I dreamt that I was helping out with some ceremony.” K’é focused *their eyes so hard that wrinkles appeared on *their forehead.
I’m outside a hogan. It’s a sunny day, blue skies forever. The land is dusty brown and there is a mountain behind me. I see homes that are boxy and painted different colors on the hill behind the hogan. There are a lot of people at this ceremony. I see people arriving in trucks and cars. Some have arrived on horses who take cover from the sun under trees nearby their tails swishing away flies as they lazily chew hay. Anyway, I’m standing outside this hogan. I see people who feel familiar but I don’t recognize them.
K’é opened *their eyes and realized *their hands were intertwined with Asdzáá Hashké’s, as if they had both been on a long journey, as if she needed to look through the window on K’é’s memory.
“Shiyáázh,” Asdzáá Hashké said, looking into K’é’s eyes. “Everyone can dream. But it sounds like your dreams are asking you to do more than watch. They are asking you to Travel. To send a message to another the other side. Would you like to learn? Would you like me to teach you?”
“Yes, shimá.”
JENNIFER’S USUAL SIX-PACK and bottle of wine had done the trick again and she was passed out on the couch watching The Late Show. Beyond the show’s audience laughter and celebrity conversations, other voices began to echo between her ears. In her usual drunken stupor, she never dreamed. But, tonight, the sensations were inescapable.
It’s dark and warm. There are hushed voices all around the room that Jennifer finds herself in. Her eyes slowly adjust. There’s a smoke hole right in the centre of the room with a shaft of light pouring in. Dust hangs in the air, small particles that move like a school of fish with each exhale and brush of hand in the air. There is an entrance covered by fabric of some sort. Jennifer looks down and sees that she is shirtless. There is a bunch of green plants in one hand and a braid of plants tied around her other wrist. She sees her chest has been dusted with black paint. She looks down and sees a flattened chest rather than her breasts.
“Turn this way.” A voice breaks the warm silence and Jennifer looks at a hand reaching out of the darkness to fasten the braid on her wrist. Another hand touches her on the back, adjusting a thin sash hanging from one shoulder to the opposite hip.
“TELL ME THE REST OF YOUR DREAM,” said Asdzáá Hashké.
K’é continued.
I hear voices inside the hogan. Many voices. I look down and see that I’m wearing blue leggings, a shirt that is buttoned up, and shoes that feel tight. I have on a hat with a white brim. My left wrist has a beautiful black leather wrist guard embellished with a silver and turquoise pattern. It’s my shield.
“Are they ready?” I say this to the folks inside the hogan although I don’t know who I’m speaking to or about. After a moment, the voices inside say to me, “Aoo’.” I lift the flap to the hogan and as my eyes adjust to the folks standing inside, I wake up.
SHE HEARS A DEEP VOICE from outside the room. “Are they ready?”
After one final adjustment of fabric around her head she hears the word, “Aoo’.” Jennifer knows that word means “yes” yet she has never heard it before.
Jennifer woke up suddenly. She tipped her bottle of wine over and its contents soaked through the edge of her sofa. Her face was damp with sweat and her shirt was covered with the remnants of orange Cheese Balls. “Shit.” She pulled herself up and rubbed the sleep from her eyes. She checked the clock on the wall. Six a.m.
She put the wine bottle on the coffee table, pulled herself up from the couch, and walked toward the bathroom. The warm hug that had her floating in a cloud of numbness all evening had been replaced by a sinister grip of the morning. She felt herself getting sick. With her hand on the wall, she found the toilet, dropped to her knees, and dry heaved. Snakes of saliva and vomit dangled from cracked lips. Her head reverberated with pain and she pulled herself to the sink and slowly washed her face. She cupped the cool water, sipped a little, swished it in her mouth, and spat it out. Her mouth tasted sour. Soon her face started to tingle and come alive. She could feel the cool tiles underneath her feet. She had two hours to make herself presentable for work.
As she sipped Pedialyte for breakfast and ate small bites of toast, she searched her wrist for the braid of plants. She stood frozen for a moment remembering small slivers of her dream. She looked at her kitchen with its bright overhead light littered with dead bugs and suddenly remembered her dream’s dirt floor, warm darkness, smell of smoke, and soft voices. Jennifer looked down at her hands holding her toast. Her mouth went dry and her tongue moved gritty pieces of toast to the back of her throat. As she swallowed the toast, she realized she had swallowed too much and the pressure of the lump of toast moved down her esophagus painfully.
She touched her chest and felt the soft mounds of her breasts. Jennifer vaguely recalled the greasy black paint across the flat chest in her dream. She swatted crumbs off her chest, took one last sip of her Pedialyte, grabbed her bag and keys, and with a sigh, opened her front door. Jennifer leaned against the cool of the door with her forehead as she locked it and walked down the hallway toward the street. Hoping to not run into anyone she knew, she slipped on her shades, and made her way to work.
Once she got to her desk and opened up her email, she saw a reminder about Elder Thomas’s visit.
FROM: Moves Camp, Leslie
TO: All Staff
Reminder that we are still taking one-on-one sessions with Elder Thomas who is visiting with our staff this week. He is here on Thursday afternoon and Friday afternoon 1:00 p.m.–5:00 p.m. Thursday afternoon he has 30-minute sessions with clients, so please make sure you help clients schedule time with him. Additionally, if staff would like a 30-minute time slot with him please let me know by the end of day today. Be sure to bring some tobacco to offer Elder Thomas. You are invited to the community feast Friday after work in the Great Conference Room here at the Indigenous Health Centre 6:00 p.m.–8:00 p.m. If you would like to volunteer to help set up and clean up, please let me know as well by the end of today.
Have a good day!
Leslie Moves Camp
JENNIFER EAGERLY SIGNED HERSELF UP for a consultation with Elder Thomas. She hoped he knew the word she heard in her dream. She wrote it down on a sticky note. “Oo?! Sounds like oat.”
ASDZÁÁ HASHKÉ LISTENED INTENTLY … After hearing about *their dream, she knew K’é was the right choice as her apprentice. *They were already Travelling to the other side and visiting ancestors.
“Yáah, that’s a beautiful dream.” She twiddled her fingers in excitement. K’é sat looking at *their empty tea cup, waiting for Asdzáá Hashké to help *them make sense of *their dream.
“You made contact with our ancestors from long ago, shiyáázh. I was right in choosing you as my apprentice. Right now, you are Travelling by accident. But I can teach you to Travel there on purpose. Do you understand?”
K’é felt the hair on *their arms slowly rise. *Their vision sharpened and *their mouth became dry. *They took in this information nodding slowly. *They knew what this meant.“I’m a Traveller? Someone who can journey from this world to next?” *they asked in a mixture of excitement and fear.
“Aoo’. And, we must teach you how to handle this energy so we can communicate with our ancestors. I want to get some messages across.” K’é nodded, took in a huge breath, and let it out slowly.
Asdzáá Hashké laughed. “Hey, it’s not that scary. I’ve been Travelling for many decades now. We’re going to do it together.”
K’é looked up from *their tea and a smile formed on *their lips. Asdzáá Hashké got up and poured *them some more tea. She shared the cornbread K’é had brought. *They dipped their bread into *their tea and gathered *their thoughts. It was going to be an exciting evening.
After they finished the cornbread and tea, Asdzáá Hashké’s face lit up.
“Okay, let’s begin. Get comfortable in your chair. Ready?” She looked right into K’é’s eyes with her eyebrows raised. K’é nodded and took in a deep breath. “Aoo’.”
“The first thing we will do is slow everything down with our breath and attention.” She slowly raised her hand from her lap to the height of her head with an in-breath and lowered her hand with an even slower out-breath. She did this for ten minutes, all the while K’é found themselves getting sleepier and sleepier. “Try to stay in both the here and now and the dream world. That’s the doorway.”
With eyes half-closed and body half-present, K’é nodded *their head slowly and followed Asdzáá Hashké’s hand rising and falling. As her hands slowed down even more, she started asking *them questions:
“Where are we now?”
“Ah … sitting in a truck playing with some house keys … or …”
“Do you see me?”
“You’re … off to the left side of me …”
“What am I wearing?”
K’é let *their eyes close to concentrate more. “You have on grey pants … light brown or a cream-coloured shirt and a jacket …”
“What else do you see?”
“The inside of the truck, the keys in my hand, and we’re in front of a house … it’s blue and has white trim on the windows with flower boxes underneath the windows. I feel like I know the people in the house … wait, the image is dissolving away …”
“It’s okay, stay with me … I’ll see you inside.”
K’é’s eyes fluttered open and for a split second saw Asdzáá Hashké with her hand on the table and her eyes rapidly darting back and forth beneath her eyelids, as if in a trance.
Asdzáá Hashké called K’é back into the dream and K’é followed by closing *their eyes. “Where are we now?”
“There’s a sink to my left and your right. Why can’t I see your face?”
“Try not to focus on that too much. I can feel you in the space … focus on that sensing … relax yourself a little more.”
“Okay … am I dreaming?”
“You’re Travelling now. Keep going.”
“I know we were just outside and now I’m here with you standing in front of me … I still can’t see your face but you have on the same clothes and you have to head out somewhere. Oh, this is so strange to tell you that I just dreamt about you while we are Travelling. I mean, we’re Travelling together … I’m following you … uh …”
“They’re the same. The only difference is we know how to do this on purpose. I’m going to go now and you will wake up soon …”
The image dissolved slowly. K’é took one more look out the window to the field of blue-grey sagebrush, red dirt, and mesa dotted with pine trees. The feathered clouds fell from the sky and K’é opened *their eyes to see Asdzáá Hashké looking at *them from across the table. She put her hand over *theirs and smiled wearily. “You did well, shiyáázh. Not bad for your first time following me in.”
K’é returned the smile and noticed *their shirt was damp from sweat and *their hands were clammy. Asdzáá Hashké squeezed *their hand and then K’é pulled *their hands down to their pants to wipe *their palms.
“Wow, I’m tired,” K’é said.
“Let’s take a few minutes to recover before we go in again, okay?”
“Okay. Thanks.” K’é sighed and got up to get a glass of water for both of them.
“That’s the trade-off. You get used to it. I learned to not do anything too demanding after Travelling. You’re young yet, so it won’t be too tiring when you’re starting out.”
“It reminds me of those dreams I have where I fly around. I wake up feeling like I ran a marathon.”
Asdzáá Hashké smiled. “It’s one thing to figure that out on your own. It’s another to bring someone in with you and lead them through.”
“Will I learn how to do that too? To lead someone through?”
“Yes, but for the next while we will just have you follow me in.”
“Where do we go when we go in? I know we call it dreams, but where are dreams?”
“We don’t go anywhere; we’re already there. We are using our mind and body to shorten the space between the worlds so we can enter—it’s a shared space. Does that make sense?”
“Not really … but I trust you.”
“In our next jaunt in, stay close by. I need your energy to get a message across to a relative. Will you do that for me?” she asked behind tired eyes.
“Of course, anything you need.”
“You see … I’m too old now to do this on my own. I’m going to need your help. And you kind of owe me one,” Asdzáá Hashké said jokingly.
“What do you mean?”
“You remember how I told you that people returned to the reservation because they were all being guided by dreams? And remember how we all hid in our canyons and bunkers and how it saved us from destruction? Well guess which old woman Travelled to your mother’s dreams to make her return home?”
“Mine?”
“Yes. And guess who she was pregnant with when she finally arrived?”
“Me?”
“Exactly. Now it’s your turn to Travel and dream our ancestors back to their rightful home.”
“Whoa.” K’é considered the enormity of this knowledge, like considering the enormity of the universe, all trapped in the body of this supposedly frail elder.
“I know. It’s big. It’s confusing,” Asdzáá Hashké said with a chuckle.
K’é sat down in front of Asdzáá Hashké. Again, just like last time, she raised her hand and started the slow breathing. K’é closed *their eyes and slipped into the dream.
*They are on a couch. Asdzáá Hashké sits on the chair at the kitchen table nearby.
“Good, you made it through. I don’t think our relative is here yet. Let’s look around the house,” she says as she stands up and walks into the kitchen. K’é looks around and notices how messy the room is. Cheese Balls littered across the coffee table. A bottle of Pedialyte, half empty, sits on the counter. A bright overhead light is littered with dead bugs. The sound of keys turning the lock. The front door opens. *They look up and notice a woman standing in the doorway. She looks back at K’é and Asdzáá Hashké in confusion.
“Oh god. Am I dreaming again? Wha …? I think I fell asleep in front of the TV again. Where am I?” The woman motions to leave, panicked.
“No, stop! Don’t go! I mean …” The woman recognizes K’é’s voice. She looks back and forth between K’é and Asdzáá Hashké in confusion and fear. K’é looks toward the kitchen at Asdzáá Hashké wondering what to do next.
“Hello, Jennifer,” Asdzáá Hashké says calmly.
“How do you know my name?!”
“We were waiting for you. I’m just making my rounds visiting family.”
“I don’t understand. You’re family?”
“Aoo’, shiyáázh. Listen, K’é and I don’t have much time. We have to go soon. So I need you to listen to me. You need to come home.”
“You need me to what?!” Jennifer says incredulously.
“Come home. There’s no more time for being lost. It’s time to be found.”
Jennifer watches the two visions disappear into the ether before hearing Asdzáá Hashké say one last time, “We have to go now. Come home, Jennifer.”