Beads in the Southwest, Part I: Mythic Turquoise

     Bluebird wore a robe of blue beads and on his head a bright blue cloud.  In his right hand he held a rattle made of blue turquoise and in his left a stalk of blue corn.  When the people asked what he had brought, Bluebird said: I bring you blue sky, summer rain and soft corn. --Old Navajo Myth

     Turquoise is the sacred stone for Native Americans of the Southwest.  It is the vehicle for the creative force which awakens and animates all life, both temporal and spiritual.  Coming from the womb of earth where all life emerged, according to Pueblo legend, it possesses the power associated with the color blue.  The Hopis tell of an all-pervasive spirit, Whuring Whuti, or Hard Beings Woman, mother of the universe who is always identified with beads of turquoise and shell.  Like turquoise, she is of the earth, but like the color blue, she is also of the skies and all the earth's waterways.  It is she who created the Male Earth-Spirit of crops and the Childbirth Water Woman, dual symbols of human fertility.  The Sun Spirit, ritually dressed in eagle feathers and beads of turquoise and shell, crosses the sky each day and finishes his journey at her home in the western ocean.
     The Navajos have many myths concerning the birth of the Turquoise Goddess or Changing Woman.  When Mother Sky and Father Earth came together they created her, born as a small turquoise image who grew in beauty, an ever-renewing life spirit.  In some myths she has her island home in the western ocean where the sun-bearer rests at the end of the day.  In other stories, she has a twin, White Shell Woman, who has her home in  the ocean from where she sends spring breezes and summer rain.  Turquoise woman made the sun with turquoise beads taken from her right breast and created the moon with white shells from her left breast.

Coming Sunday, July 3, 2011: Part II, Turquoise in Pre-Historic Ceremonial Offerings
  

Books I'm Working On

Here's a blurb about the first two books in my trilogy.  They are finished and in the hands of a publisher at this moment.  If I don't get a contract, I'm going to publish them as e-books.  Stay tuned!

Waiting for Mr. Wu: A Novel of Intrigue, Cultural Clashes and Desire
The eccentric relationship between a patrician Chinese ex-patriot and a young girl from rural Arizona form the crux of this book.  The yin-yang of imperial China juxtaposed against pop America, the frustration of lovers separated by years, culture, and distance set up a dynamic tension that plays out in the American Southwest and Beijing.  Mr. Wu, the illusive millionaire and occasional spy, didn't plan on mixing it up with rednecks and cowboys, but most of all, he didn't plan on falling in love with an erstwhile flower child.

Fearless Frank's Last Chance Dance: A Novel of Rednecks, Rage and Redemption
Ex-cop Frank Toscanni is living in a Doc Holliday kind of world, shooting off a lock if he can't find the key and bullying people into submission.  In the middle of an ugly divorce and drinking heavily, harassed by the Civil Liberties Union for policy brutality and agonizing over his future, he runs into Mallory Hamilton, a careless heiress searching for her biological mother in Arizona.

She fuels his jealousy and desire, using him as a part time plaything while they look for her family.  After traversing a  trail of white supremacists, Harley-riding ex-cons, undocumented Mexican immigrants and Barbie doll collectors, the search culminates in a postmodern remake of the gunfight at OK Corral and Frank finds redemption where he least expects it.

Why The Hopis Have So Few Beads, Part Two

The Chief asked him why he had come. “I have searched for the path,” the young man replied, “and thought about the water running and knew I had to come this way that it runs. I search also for a woman, the Huruing Wuhti, goddess of all hard substances who is owner of many turquoise, shell, and coral beads.”

“You will get there because your heart is right,” the Chief told him, “but now this night you must sleep here.” During the night the Chief instructed him about the Snake cult, the altar, and the ceremony he would perform when he returned to his people.

In the morning he went with Spider Woman and made a rainbow road to the home of Huruing Wuhti high on the cliffs. They went in and found a withered old hag. All the walls were hung with beads and shells. The young man gave her a baho and she thanked him in a faint, far-away voice. At sundown she went into a side chamber and returned as an alluring young woman carrying many robes with which she made a bed. Then she commanded him to sleep with her. Spider Woman whispered that he most comply. Thus he remained four days with the goddess, but after that he wanted to return to his people. She went into a room on the north side and got a turquoise bead and from the west room the same. From the south room she brought a coral bead and from the east a hard white bead made of shell. Then she gave him all kinds of other beads and put them in a bag for him, instructing him not to open the bag or all the beads would be gone and could never increase.

He returned to the Snake kiva and stayed four nights, taking the beautiful girl who had been the most ferocious snake as his wife. Then he made ready to take her and the beads to his people waiting in the Grand Canyon country. As he was leaving the Chief said, "This woman will bear you children and there will be many. They will hold the Snake ceremony with you."

So they started on their way. Spider Woman also warned him not to sleep with his wife during the journey or she would disappear, along with the beads. As they started, the beads were not heavy and the first night they slept separately. The next three nights were spent in the same manner. The beads increased and the bag became very heavy. As they approached his home, the young man was overcome with desire to see the beads and sleep with his wife, but she remained strong and forbade it. They were almost home and had but one day’s travel to fill the bag completely with beads. During the last night the man opened the bag, although his wife begged him not to. As he took them out he saw they were the finest beads and shells. He spread them on the ground and hung them around his neck and was very happy. But in the morning all the beads had disappeared except the few original ones that the Huruing Wuhti had given him. Hence the Hopis have so few beads at this present time.

Why the Hopis Have So Few Beads--Part One

Aliksai!  In the Grand Canyon country they were living, by the banks of a river…a people not yet known as the Snake Clan.  One day the son of the Chief said, “Father, I have to go this way that the water runs.”  And so he sailed down the river and came to the fullness of the ocean.  There he found the island home of Kohkang Wuhti, the Spider Woman, who called the boy to come inside.

He told her a story from the myths of his people and gave her a prayer stick called a baho, explaining that he had come in search of the beads which were sacred to his clan.  She gestured over the waters to a kiva far away and said that the beads and corals were there, but the path had always been guarded by wild animals.  “I will take you,” she promised, “because you have made me happy with your stories and the power of your prayers.”

Spider Woman gave him medicine which he took into his mouth and then spurted across the waters.  A rainbow bridge appeared, arching to the kiva.  On this bridge they encountered a panther, bear, wildcat, wolf, and rattlesnake.  All these animals he subdued with the help of the medicine.

As they descended into the kiva they found a people with painted faces and many beads around their necks.  Presently the Chief handed him a pipe and said, “Smoke and swallow the smoke.”  Now this swallowing of smoke was a test and Spider Woman had prepared him for this moment.  Anyone not able to swallow without dizziness or choking would be driven off.  She stood behind him and drew the smoke out of him with her hidden powers.

Then the Chief directed the people to dress in their snake costumes and told the young man to look away.  When he turned around, all but the Chief had turned into bulls, racers, and rattlers that writhed and hissed across the floor.  While his head was turned Spider woman told him that this was yet another test, that he should never fear to touch the snakes.  Among the people was a girl of great beauty who had turned into the angriest rattlesnake of all.  Take that one, Spider Woman gestured, handing him medicine.  He poured the medicine on the snake, seizing it up and stroking it gently.  The Chief was astonished when the snake became docile and bade the young man now to become initiated as one of them.  The snakes once more assumed their human form.
 

Part Two coming soon!

A Bedtime Story for Beady-Eyed Children

Once upon a time in a kingdom by the bay, a flower child whom we shall call Lady Ann set out to find adventure across the continent in Woodstock, New York.  There our fair maiden encountered an angst-ridden prince from the realm of Brooklyn.  "Don't flinch, Fair Prince," she cried. "I shall rescue you from your psychiatrist and your fear of fresh air and sunshine."  Alas, despite the birth of the Crown Prince of Cocopah, this union was doomed by the gods.  Poor Lady Ann!  Alone in this cruel world with a babe at her breast.

But Lady Ann was a resourceful little hippie chick and wrote the epic tome on raising both princes and peasants as vegetarians, The Organic Baby Food Book, published by Simon & Schuster.  But the nasty old Powers That Be in publishing wouldn't let her use the word 'vegetarian' or publish her militant vegetarian introduction, reducing it to a harmless little cookbook.  Poor Lady Ann!

Using the advance money from that book, She opened Woodstock's first bead store but suffered from gray winters and bad business.  So she packed up the crown prince and headed back to the Golden West. Guided only by angels, phoenixes, unicorns and a really good AAA Trip Tik, she landed in Sedona and set up Cocopah, Sedona's first bead shop.  Concocting magical bead kits that people came from near and far to string, she also made amulets that gave the wearer the power of being truly Beady-Eyed.

Lady Ann's adventures along the way will soon be published in the great (or at least adequate) American novel, Waiting for Mr.Wu. You'll want to stay tuned and learn how she met the powerful King of Wu who rescued her bead business and introduced her to Beijing.

HOW YOU CAN HELP LADY ANN:
1.  Visit http://www.beadofthemonthclub.com/ and buy lots of beads
2.  Visit Cocopah and Cocopah North in Sedona, the oldest bead establishments in Arizona.
3.  Demand a new publication of The Organic Baby Food Book
4.  Demand publication of Waiting for Mr. Wu (and the two other novels in the'New West' trilogy.)
5.  Buy my son's book: Busted by M. Chris Fabricant
Next Posting: June 1, 2011 on why the Hopis have so few beads.