Connections across time
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I glanced at the recent cover blurb, "What Happened to the Anasazi?" and felt a familiar and weary irritation (HCN, 10/3/05: Out of the Four Corners). I continue to believe the only adequate response to that question is: "Ask the Hopi, the Paiute, the Havasupai, the Hualapi. They will tell you." Then, I read the sidebar to the piece, "Anasazi: What’s in a Name." My irritation faded. I read the whole piece, my mind open to the writer and to his subjects: Susan Ryan, respect and the threads that weave across time and between people.
Craig Childs’ humility — in the face of connections far older and more irresistible than our conjectures — is surpassed only by that of Ryan. I’m grateful for Childs’ capacity for deep listening, and for writing the hard beauty of paradox. Here is the crux of his work and Ryan’s, this sentence: "She is merely the next in line, a woman mindful of small acts, making sure that the rooms are buried so that her presence, too, will fade with time."
Thank you.
Mary Sojourner
Flagstaff, Arizona
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