Love Letter to Ramah
Love Letter to Ramah
Living Beside New Mexico's Trail of the Ancients
In 1998 Tim and Lucia Amsden left their familiar lives in Kansas City and moved to the Ramah Valley in northwestern New Mexico. Love Letter to Ramah recounts their two decades of experiences there, nestled among an eclectic and diverse community of loving, earth-rooted people. It is also an evocation of the rich human and natural history permeating the area and the importancecentral to the traditional beliefs of Indigenous peopleof living in concert with the living earth.
They built their house a few miles outside the tiny town of Ramah, an area where Mormons farm, old Spanish missions hunker above the bones of ancient peoples, and Native cultures abound. Beside the town runs New Mexico Highway 53, a two-lane road that meanders southwest from Grants to the Arizona border, tracing an ancient trade and exploration route that has existed for more than a thousand years.
Much of New Mexico carries a strong sense of place, and that’s especially true in the Ramah area where the rich cultural tapestry, the geology and natural history, and the sky and brilliant night stars all give the land a deep and abiding energy. Many traditional Native American belief systems recognize the spiritual life of all things; in the land of the Puebloans and the Navajo, it’s easy to believe.
Living in that place and within that community gave Tim and Lucia a profound and visceral understanding of our need to move the fragile blue marble of our earth back into balance. Just as important, it enhanced their awareness that we must shift ourselves into acknowledgment of and respect for our global community. It also gave them a firm belief that those things are indeed possible.
“A book of gentle wisdom and quiet inspiration.…If you want to understand both the land and the culture of northern New Mexico, you couldn’t find a better source.”—Glenn Aparicio Parry, author of Original Politics: Making America Sacred Again
“Tim Amsden reveals a deep sense of the land and lore of that patch of paradise presently known as New Mexico, and he presents the reader with a wide range of insights into the nature of the ecology, cultural diversity, deep history, and exquisite beauty of the Southwest.”—Jack Loeffler, author of A Pagan Polemic: Reflections on Nature, Consciousness, and Anarchism
“Amsden’s stories illustrate how his time in the Ramah area cultivated his deep sense of place and rekindled his belief in the sustaining power of a diverse human community. I highly recommend it as an introduction to this beautiful portion of the American Southwest and a heartwarming read for those of us still open to awe and connection.”—Carla R. Van West, former director of research, SRI Foundation
Tim Amsden is the author of the poetry collection Vanishing Point.
Preface
Acknowledgements
Chapter 1. Smallpox and a Ghost
Chapter 2. Off the Cliff
Chapter 3. Father John
Chapter 4. A Wedding in the Woods
Chapter 5. Folk Music
Chapter 6. Glowing Bones
Chapter 7. Flames and Fangs
Chapter 8. First People
Chapter 9. Horses Coming Home
Chapter 10. Wave Riding
Chapter 11. Blue Bird Flour
Chapter 12. The Casket Makers
Chapter 13. Vampire Bugs
Chapter 14. Pueblo Indians
Chapter 15. The Navajo Nation
Chapter 16. Starry, Starry Night
Chapter 17. Medicine Wheel and a Blessing
Chapter 18. Fire and Ice
Chapter 19. Sense of Place
Chapter 20. The Old Zuni Mission
Chapter 21. Shalako
Chapter 22. Santo Niño
Chapter 23. Horny and Spadefoot
Chapter 24. Growers
Chapter 25. Genízaros
Chapter 26. Los Hermanos Penitentes
Chapter 27. Ramah Lake
Chapter 28. Water Wars
Chapter 29. Big Bird and Little Bird
Chapter 30. Bear Heart
Chapter 31. Sun Dance
Chapter 32. Sueños
Chapter 33. Zuni Mountain Stupa
Chapter 34. Exploder
Chapter 35. Duke City
Chapter 36. Talking Pots
Further Reading
