The Beginning
The first school I attended was an Indian boarding school. I remember the first day of kindergarten. I remember seeing my mom leave quickly when I ran towards her. The blue carpet is what I remember, the off-white walls of adobe plaster blurred the small bookcases all around. Mom held the door as I screamed to open it. The teacher pulled me away. Mom disappeared.
Luckily, I was a day student—meaning, I was one of the lucky few. Many of my classmates lived inside the dorms they supplied—because of the road systems, the mud and snow and dirt and rain made their return home hard, unreachable. They lived there during weekends, during holidays, while I returned home each day, luckily.
The first poem I wrote in college was an imitation poem. The poem was called Assembly Line. It was after a poem written by Shu Ting. My first day of school at Nenahnezad was in 1980. My poem was about the assemblage, our formation, our allegiance to this country. The building had tiny slivers scratched into its side. During recess, students lined along the sandstone walls. With a rock in hand, they scraped into the building’s side—dirt powdered into their tiny-cupped hands.
They would eat it like Kool-Aid.
I tell people, that’s why we love the smell of desert rain. It smells like home when the rain mixes into the dirt. It’s a beautiful memory, I say.
I tell people when I think of boarding school, the students ate the dirt they carved `from the building—maybe it tasted like home, a home they missed, a home they remembered on their tongues.
I tell people, that’s why we love the smell of desert rain. It smells like home when the rain mixes into the dirt. It’s a beautiful memory, I say.
I tell people when I think of boarding school, the students ate the dirt they carved `from the building—maybe it tasted like home, a home they missed, a home they remembered on their tongues.
Humor, like rain, is medicine for my people. We tell jokes and laugh as Navajos from the reservation. Humor can also be bad medicine. It can be directed and pointed as a reminder of embarrassments of failure of childhood trauma.
I used to wet the bed.
In a house of nine people with four bedrooms, I was
more of a couch-wetter
a floor stainer.
I learned how to do laundry young
because I woke to wet clothes and wet blankets.
My mom was upset, never understanding why I continued to wet myself.
In the early mornings, I hid my
clothes, hid the
blankets, learned to
camouflage areas
marked.
Mom’s carpet ruined.
Mom’s couches ruined.
The family called me, Pee-bag.
I hated my name growing up. There was a boy who lived across the street. He was tall and thin, and his name was Byron, too. He was flamboyant, a sissy, a queer. The family laughed and called me Byron Blueeyes, at times.
That was his name.
That was his name.
Seth and I met on MySpace. I’ve never told anyone we met online, randomly. We made up a story where we met in Washington. It wasn’t a lie. I lived in Olympia for two months.
Seth lived in Seattle for ten years. Maybe we met at R-place, randomly.
Seth’s eyes are as blue as crystal water.
In Navajo, the word for blue is dootłizh.
I married Seth on 11/12/13.
I call Seth, Anáá’ dootłliz: Turquoise Eyes.
We married the white way.
I became Byron Anáá Dootłizh: Byron Turquoise Eyes:
Byron Blueeyes.
The Navajo word for pee is lizh.
Seth lived in Seattle for ten years. Maybe we met at R-place, randomly.
Seth’s eyes are as blue as crystal water.
In Navajo, the word for blue is dootłizh.
I married Seth on 11/12/13.
I call Seth, Anáá’ dootłliz: Turquoise Eyes.
We married the white way.
I became Byron Anáá Dootłizh: Byron Turquoise Eyes:
Byron Blueeyes.
The Navajo word for pee is lizh.
Byron F. Aspaas was raised within the four sacred mountains of Dinétah. His first published work was included in Yellow Medicine Review and since then his writing has appeared in numerous journals and anthologies. Byron’s writing revisits the destruction of sacred land and engages his readers in a dialogue about preserving Diné culture and land. He uses imagery and persona to present explorations of language, landscape, and identity. Byron is faculty at San Juan College’s English Department and Western Colorado University’s Creative Writing Program.
Header photo by Sailik Sengupta, courtesy Pixabay.
