Arrivals|Departures

I just moved for the third time since I arrived in San Diego one year ago.

I have moved so many times I feel as if I have left pieces of me all over this town. This last move is only a precursor to the next move—back to Chicago where my twin sister lives. I have been moving my entire adolescent and adult life. When my sister and I were born my mother buried our umbilical cords under the house. An umbilical cord is what is left over after a baby is born. It is that small piece of the umbilical cord that is tied off that eventually turns into a small scab that falls off. She did it so that no matter where we go and what we do our spirits always will know where home is.

I grew up on the Navajo Reservation in Window Rock, AZ. My entire family still lives there. As a child the Mars-like mesas and wide-open space was my back yard. My entire extended family lived in a half-mile radius of one another and our life was a series of family events. If I had a bad dream I would wake up my grandmother in the middle of the night and tell her every single thing. She would bring me into the kitchen. She never turned on the lights but used her hands, the familiarity of over 30 years in that house. Together we would burn fresh cedar over the stove and pray as we let the pungent smoke wash over us. When we were done she would use her thumb with the black ash on the pad and rub a bit on my forehead. Afterwards she would walk me back to my room where my twin sister lay and put me to bed, and I slept, confident in her powers. I was never in need of anything. In my family if someone is in need of money, food, gas, water, or shelter, the family bands together to provide it, regardless of availability. In a way our egalitarian lifestyle has left little room for selfish behaviors.

My mother has always trail-blazed her way in life. She became a mother of twins at the age of 17 and spent the first few years working numerous minimum wage jobs. When we were 5 she decided the only way she was going to create opportunities for her daughters was to get a better education and a better job. We moved to Albuquerque, NM amid my extended family’s disapproval. It is a hard thing to walk away from that type of security, but it was that same security that gave my mother the courage to try. When she graduated we moved back to the reservation. I’ve never forgotten those 5 years. When I was 13 I decided that I wanted to go to boarding school on the East Coast. I remember sitting my grandparents down and telling them that I too was in need of something more, something they and the family could not provide. It was one of the hardest things I have ever done. It took many years for them to completely forgive me for leaving. At times I’m not sure I have forgiven myself.

Since then I have lived in five cities all over this country and traveled many parts of Europe. I went to work in film, believing that this was going to be the forum in which I would introduce the world to the modern Native American. I wanted to replace the stereotypes of the drunken Indian or the stoic mysticism of the brave Native and to put a face on a people whose lives are as scattered and complicated as every other American's. I felt that I would do my part, as I was a representation of who we were becoming.

But in all that time, in all that traveling I have spent the majority of it moving closer to home. I’ve worked in film and video for the last few years, making ends meet as an editor or assistant producer for commercial works, yet seeming to move further and further from my goal: to make a movie about contemporary Native American life.

I am discovering that my path is a long, nomadic journey to find the balance between being who I am as a Navajo and as an American and to make a place for myself in each of these worlds.

Copyright 2004 Vanessa Roanhorse

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