SRP-MIC

No, the acronym does not stand for Sharp Microphone. On April 20, 2024 I again celebrated Earth Day at the SVM table-booth, except that we were now on the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community land (SRP-MIC). By the way, the Pima are Akimel O’Odham and the Maricopa call themselves Piiposh (spelling varies). This is going to be a long picture story because I attended another event later in the afternoon. I should have enuf pixel room to complete the projected blog. So, relax in a comfortable chair and prepare to read a picture book.

Remember, I have a readign problem that sometimes shows itself in my writing with words that have all the correct letters but they are in the wrong order.

I parked in a paved parking lot at the SE corner of Osborne and Longmore Streets and wondered where the event was being held. I knew it was somewhere very close by. The museum, below, caught my eye and I walked over to it. The museum was closed but the outdoor exhibits were interesting.

Notice the alternate, or former, spelling of the O’Odham word “huhugam.” The Native American tribes are very proud of their warriors who have fought with the US military in wars beginning with WW I (and maybe earlier). The date on this marker seems to be the day the museum was dedicated.

The main entrance of the museum.

Detail of museum walls. Portions are left unplastered so visitors can see how the walls are actually constructed. I think this may have been an 1800s adaptation of ancient construction and European roof and fireplace. Native Americans of southern Arizona probably did build houses like this (but smaller) as their homes after they saw European houses.

This was their home style before the Europeans began invading. It is called a wickiup. The upright poles are acting as the wooden door for the entrance. I like the saguaro family approaching the dwelling.

Roof with rain-resistant layers of brush and mud.

Standing at the museum I saw two white canopies so I headed over their way. It was the event. But there were no signs Event→ at the three parking areas.

I then heard an amplified voice telling vendors to step inside the restaurant to sign in. So I did. Part of the sign-in process was to sign this liability waiver. (Desiree told me no waiver signing was required last year.) I wonder what kind of lawsuit was brought against the tribe during the past year.

After I signed the waiver I was given this T-shirt and a paper bracelet to trade for lunch.

An excellent motto. The heart is where the O’Odham and Piipash people live/once lived.

Apparently it says the same thing in O’Odham. (I asked some natives and the non-English language is O’Odham, not Piiposh.)

Frank was already wearing an appropriate shirt for the day, but he did accept a free shirt for other occasions. Frank, Desiree, and I handled the S’edav Va’aki booth from 9:30 to noon.

SPR-MIC’s Community Development Department table. Community logo and department logo.

I have hiked some of the trails this group has developed on their land north of Mesa, etc.

In this game, players are supposed to match the plastic paw prints with the animal pictures. At first, I thought the plastic piece on far left was a string of coyote or fox scat, but then the toes were pointed out to me. I wish I had taken time to play the game.

A fascinating Bingo game.

An example of a card a player would hold.

This block game is meant to teach what happens when too much of an important section of an environment is removed. The environment collapses.

Players roll the die, below, and remove a block protraying the picture that shows on top when the die stops rolling. Eventually, the player will remove a board during which removal will cause the pile to collapse.

The woman wearing this skirt seemed to be one of the Native Americans who were administering the Earth Day event. I’d never seen these designs on clothing before.

The Rio Reimagined (TRR). Their website has this map in better detail: https://rioreimagined.org/

A craft children (or adults) can do at the TRR table.

Or perhaps decorate this spider. TRR is trying to not only provide cleaner water for humans but for all life that depends on these two rivers.

Center for Native and Urban Wildlife. CNUW

CNUW is associated with the Scottsdale Community College. I wonder if these events help leaders of Native American conservation groups and of non-Native American groups to meet each other and therefore stay in touch and work together.

The current leasees of this land were recently given authority to open the uranimu mine. However, the Havasupai tribe, who live on a year-round-running tributary of the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon, feel effluent from the mine, whether solid or liquid, would foul the Havasupai water and they would no longer have potable water for their bodies and their crops.

Liberty Wildlife states its mission on its tablecloth.

The woman holding the bird’s leash talked about specific reasons why and methods how wildlife are cared for. When possible, the animals are set free after treatment. This bird’s other eye, the one you cannot see, is injured and the bird cannot see well enuf to be able to feed and protect itself in the wild. When staff realized they were not going to be able to release the bird they gradually habituated it to being oohed and aahed at by groups of humans. The bird’s markings are beautiful.

I’ve never been this close to a vulture before. This one did not have an offensive odor. I did not ask, but it appears they are not feeding the bird fresh (or fermented) carrion. This bird was hatched and habituated to humans by a group that “grows” exotic birds for the public. Because this bird thinks humans are part of its family it would not be safe to it to train the bird to take care of itself in the wild.

The Native American Fish and Wildlife Society did not have a printed tablecloth so they improvised with safety pins.

The society created interesting teaching games.

Anyone who knows his numbers up to 21 can play this game. That might include children who’ve had only part of a school year of kindergarten.

The group displaying the items in the next few fotos did not have a name for the group anywhere on or around its table. The Native American man sitting at the table was not very friendly, and he only partly answered my questions.

There is a shelter like this on the grounds of S’edav Va’aki. I had wondered what its purpose was. At the present it seems to be a storage area for particular equipment such as a cinder-box grill.

This sign explains it.

When I asked if this was a replica, below, of a war club. The man said it was. I’ve never seen a replica or picture of an O’Odham war club, but it obviously is part of the history of this people.

There were two doll-sized replicas of one-room log houses with roofs and doors that obviously were not of prehistoric design. The man did chat enuf so that he finally stated that the things on display were post-European invasion.

You will notice in these pictures that O’Odham words were not translated into English. I supposed this was a rack for drying food, such as strips of meat. By the time I took the pictures of this replica I was tired of trying to talk with the man so I did not ask questions.

However, one sentence below says “Used as major living space.” The man had angrily told me earlier that the people had “lived” outdoors, that houses were only for storage and for use during inclement weather. He indicated the people slept outside also.

Why would people construct a framework, for “living in”, that did not give any protection from the hot sun?

I tried to tell the man that I appreciated the craftsmanship of the person who wove the tiny basket and wove animal designs it in, but the man kept remarking about other things and did not listen to my compliment.

Everyone else I spoke to this day were freindly and helpful.

Now this is an interesting name for a group.

This is a very interesting group. If you’ve never been to the Hubbell Trading Post Monument on the Navajo Reservation, please make plans to visit it. The last time I was there (a half dozen or so years ago) the trading post still sold a lot of items as well as running the premises as a museum.

Employees of this group did repair work on a trail at El Morro National Monument in New Mexico. Top pic is “before,” lower pic is “after.”

I hope the Native American water conservation groups are working together with each other and with state and national groups. I didn’t have time to ask for detailed information from many of the booths that were at the Earth Day event.

A very interesting organization.

And someone was an excellent needle-crafter. Looks like a barely-fledged youngster.

And sculptor. I think these two plastic items were made in a mold. It is an interesting way of creating a stand for each bird.

I hope that a lot of Native American biologists apply for the positions.

The Arizona Bald Eagle Management Program is a section of CAZCA.

I think you can read the type in the picture below.

They want more hands to help, as well as more money for their conservation efforts.

The young man said he did know the reason for or derivation of the word “Brownfields.” The group keeps an eye/ear out for buildings that are going to be torn down. The group contacts the owners and offers to help with planning for redevelopment of the plot of land.

On the Internet I found this explanation: “EPA’s Brownfields Program provides grants and technical assistance to communities, states, tribes and others to assess, safely clean up and sustainably reuse contaminated properties. Feb 21, 2024″ but I could not find out why the word “Brownfields” is in the name.

“Emergency Management” seemed like a broad topic, so I asked one of the men at the desk. He said the group promotes information for individual people on Dust Storms, Extreme Heat, Flooding, Monsoon Storms, and Preparing for emergency evacuation. As he said each title he handed me a pamphlet and then handed me a “Ready, Set Go!” preparedness card.

Before I could say anything he handed me this Auto Safety Tool, below. He said that if I needed to get out of my car and I couldn’t: I should whallop the window beside me with the metal projection sticking out a quarter of an inch on the right and the window would shatter and I could push the glass away. Then I should put the slit around my seat belt and run it along the seat belt and it would cut the belt so I could get out.

I have a similar tool that I acquired a dozen or more years ago. Its instructions say to hit the very bottom of the window glass because the curvature there makes it makes it the easiest part of the window to break. I asked the man if this tool should be used on a certain part of the window and he said, “No. Just give the glass a strong whallop anywhere.” I accepted the tool and will be keeping it in the door “shelf” at my side, along with the tool I already have, but I am afraid my arms are too weak to give a “strong whallop” to anything. This tool looks easier to use than my older tool.

It was now shortly after 12 noon. My replacement volunteer had arrived and it was time to get my free lunch. I had three choices and I chose this one instead of hot dogs from another truck or some sort of chicken lunch from a portable outdoor cooking setup. I chose this van because the preservatives in wieners make me nauseated and this van was much cuter than the outdoor cooking arrangement.

I chose pulled pork quesadillas. My carrying box came with several large-pancake-looking objects folded over a thin filling. I thought perhaps my quesadillas were skimpy because many people had already been served. But since they were free, I decided to be happy, not offended.

The quesadillas were very hot. A bite threatened to burn my mouth. So I ferried them home, at which time (50 minutes later) they were just right for eating. They were delicious. I ate lunch, took a short nap, then headed for the next event.

The Arizona American Indian Tourism Association AAITA was hosting an Arizona Indian Festival (the one I’d helped with in Scottsdale Feb 3, 2024) Appreciation Dinner at the Arizona Puppet Theater, which was very close to my condo, thank goodness.

Those of you who are grandparents might want to check on upcoming performance dates.

What looked like a former Catholic church was a former Mormon Stake House. (“Stake” not “steak.”) It was surprising that the Mormons abandoned such a beautiful building after only three years. What made them move themselves and their stake house elsewhere?

I parked in the adjacent parking lot and began walking towards the building.

And came to this sign. I did not have any cash with me, so I read farther. From what I could understand a QR code on the cell fone was the only way to pay. Pay where? I walked around and found the person in charge of the appreciation dinner and asked him. I did not have to pay. None of us did. Reading more slowly and carefully now I see that the words “Puppet Theater, Patron Parking, All Others Pay to Park” means that people actually making use of the Puppet Theater Building do not have to pay. But when I read it with an exhausted brain Saturday late afternoon I thought everyone had to pay. In fact, I would still think so if people had insisted we did not have to pay and none of us received parking tickets. Why can’t institutions write in plain English?

The outdoor roofed-over porch area where the dinner was held. The temperature was still in the low 90s when I arrived but I was comfortable in the sahde. Everyone else in the shade looked comfortable, also. I guess we Phoenicians were all still frozen at core from the winter.

This is the original paintwork done on the beams in 1929, almost one hundred years ago! (95 years ago).

The little stars in the table decorations were tiny electric lights that were glowing.

I did not find the restroom. Luckily, I did not need it.

But I entered the area behind the restroom sign to look around in case I needed a restroom later. There were a couple of locked doors, a stairwell, a hall, and this room that can be rented for parties. There was no sign indicating the restrooms might be upstairs, or exactly where they were located.

This poster was one of many on the walls of the can-be-rented room.

A couple of puppets were exhibited in the hall. The picture of the marionette in this case did not turn out well because of reflection of overhead light which blotted out the face. The puppet was in Oriental clothes and I suspect it is an old, valuable item someone has donated to the Puppet Theater. I wonder about the age of the lizard puppet. Was it Oriental, also? Was it used in a scary story, or was it friendly?

I went back outside, walked the length of the porch, and entered the other door. Immediately, I was in a combination gift shop-museum.

Marionettes anyone?

Cautionary sign for people who want to try out a marionette or two before buying or not buying.

Actual figures from

past presentations of Peter Pan shows.

Someone has written a play set in the Sonoran Desert of southern Arizona.

Some famous actors from past performances.

A bit of history about the Puppet Theater. I think GAPT is Greater Arizona Puppet Theater.

The chapel is now the room with gift shop-museum.

What a little love and a lot of money did.

The social hall that is now the theater. Aren’t the entrance doors fascinating!

The restored ceiling.

Back to our dinner area. These two musicians had to sit in the sun while they serenaded us. I hope they were given an extra tip. They started with Woody Guthrie’s “This Land Is Our Land” and went thru a repertoire of songs and readings.

This refers to the unmined portion of a former Magma Mine copper-bearing area that Resolution Copper wants to open.

This license plate had arrived while I was enjoying the building and the food.

Finally . . . THE END

Earth Day Event

Gila River Indian Community invited all kinds of “vendors” to advertise their institutions at its weekend Earth Day festival. SVM was able to set up a table on Saturday April 19. I assisted the staff member, Desiree. She loves working with children so I let her take care of the craft table she had set up and I concentrated on adults and non-crafty children.

But that was after I found my way to the Gila River Indian Community Department of Environmental Quality building and grounds. I had gone on the Internet and made notes for directions for driving from my condo to the event grounds. The information on the sites was confusing and misleading and lacked at least one very important instruction but the angel of serendipity was watching over me. The morning of April 19th I eventually found myself heading east on the southern part of Loop 202. The driving instructions had died a few miles back. I knew that 202 east would soon head north and I needed to go south so I left the freeway and went down a major street. After a number of miles I crossed the Hunt Highway. I pulled into a parking lot and asked my Toyota Navigation to take me to 168 Skill Center Road in Sacaton, Arizona. It let me choose the town of Sacaton and to put in the name of the street but not the building number.

When Highway 87 was only a few yards from I-10, the freeway between Phoenix and Tucson, Toyota’s Navigator told me to turn south on another state road, 587 (or 567?). For a while I-10 parallelled us, then finally began drifting away. When I got to the edge of the town of Sacaton the Navigator said, “You are now at your destination and didn’t talk anymore.” I drove past houses until I found a gas station with a convenience store. I went inside and asked for directions. No one knew anything about the tribal Department of Environmental Quality building. But I was told to go back the way I’d come and turn left at the second paved road. On that road I would find the community’s school. An Earth Day event was being held there.

I found both, parked, and went inside the school. I asked where DEQ was. A very nice woman remarked that the school children were celebrating Earth Day nearby. When I replied that I was probably headed for an Earth Day event she stepped outside with me and said it was the second facility lot ahead, in fact, I would want to turn where that white car was just turning off the pavement. I followed her suggestion and was approached by a man with an official looking vest. A few yards away I could see a lot of white canopies. The man said, “Vendor?” I said, “Yes” altho we were not selling anything ,so he let me use that parking area. In fact, he handed me a map and showed me where the S’edav Va’aki table was. With a bit of wandering around in my vehicle it had taken me one-and-a-quarter hours to get from condo to the event grounds.

The flame erupting from the top of my head slowly departed and my day now took a turn for the better. I forgot to take a picture of the S’edav Va’aki table. It had the usual blue tablecloth and handouts about the museum and grounds.

(When I treid to upload the foto above I got the same strange denial I’d gotten yesterday with the Heard post. This time I thought perhaps the system was telling me I had reached the maximum amount of pixels I was allowed, so I went to “Media” and eliminated all fotos from the end of Feb 2024 backwards. Now I can post fotos again. Why doesn’t Word Press speak plain English?)

I looked at the fresh desert shrub plantings. The children must have been assisted to inter plant roots and beautify the grounds. What a wonderful way to help children appreciate Earth Day.

This table, below, was directly across from us. I asked what the word “anthropocene” meant. The workers were somewhat able to define the word for me. Back home I opened Merriam-Webster on-line and learned this:

Anthropocene: the period of time during which human activities have had an environmental impact on the Earth regarded as constituting a distinct geological age. / Most scientists agree that humans have had a hand in warming Earth’s climate since the industrial revolution—some even argue that we are living in a new geological epoch, dubbed the Anthropocene.—Nature, 12 Feb. 2004

I didn’t get a chance to ask them what the ESSA group does because visitors were arriving at our SVM table.

Indigenous people whose voices are respected off the reservations (such as tribal leaders) have been complaining for several years about indigenous women, in both US and Canada, that have been disappearing, and still are disappearing, but the off-reservation authorities have made to attempt to put a stop to the problem. In recent months indigenous families have also been complaining about the loss of male members, especially children and teenagers.

This is the first time I’d seen a T-shirt on the subject. I hope the student group at ASU is able to make some headway on the problem.

I did get to talk to this group, below, for a few minutes. I started by asking waht “biomimicry” was. Part of the answer was that Velcro came about due to biomimicry on the part of an engineer. Now they had my full attention. I always told the story of the invention of Velcro when I gave tours that included plants at the Boyce Thompson Arboretum.

One of the recent finds by people purposefully pursuing biomimicry has to do with sharkskin. The black roll with white edges is a piece of sharkskin. The plastic white replica is sharkskin greatly magnified. If rubbed in the direction of the scalse sharkskin feels smooth. It is so smooth that mosses cannot grow on it and neither can viruses. They simply slide off. So does the COVID virus. Scientists are now attempting to find a way to use this quality medically.

When I walked over to use one of these earth savers I smiled at the signs. “Rent A Can.” My father always called a toilet or a toilet room a “can.” I wonder where the word came from?

From the web site can | Etymology of can by etymonline: The slang meaning “toilet” is c. 1900, said to be a shortening of piss-can. The “piss-can” having derived from the use of “can” as an “air-tight vessel of tinned iron” which dates from 1867.

This large, saguaro scar tissue capsule shows why the phrase “Saguaro Boot” is not appropriate. This water-tight scar capsule was about one-and-a-half feet long and would have made a very useful canteen for the ancient dwellers of southern Arizona. It was at the National Forest booth.

The Saguaro National Park had what I considered the best setup to look at. Mr. Saguaro Ranger even had a bird’s nest hole (scar tissue capsule)!

The van was delightful. Left to right, of the things that have legs and feet, are a Gila monster, a javelina (peccary), and a what? What kind of insect is protrayed?

Quail families live in this park.

Left to right are a jackrabbit (hare), desert tortoise, saguaro with feet and shoes, and coyote, and in front lower right is a harmless lizard.

The windows were not open today so I don’t know how they are used. Maybe the rangers stand inside when no outdoor shade canopy is available.

The English sentence is repeated in O’Odham, Spanish, and Yaqui.

My shift was up, the school children were busy eating hot dogs the DEQ provided and were then heading back to school, and there did not seem to be many adult visitors. The temperature of 91 degrees probably (with an expected high of around 95 degrees) probably convinced the adults to all come during the morning also. So, even tho Frank had not arrived (had had not shown up at the Heard yesterday, either; Desiree and I were worried), Desiree convinced me to head back into the big city.

An older native man had told me to continue on “the road” and I would come to I-10. I first headed out along the north-south highway I’d arrived on but I soon realized the man had meant the road running in front of the DEQ building. My original notes had told me the bldg was only about 3 miles from the Interstate. So I turned around and headed past the school and DEQ building. The street came to a deadend. I decided to head north on the adjoining paved highway. After a short distance I could see that the road I was on apparently switched from paved to gravel. The serendipitous angel now provided stronger guidance. I pulled into a parking lot of a medical center to ask questions of desk clerks.

As I stepped out of my SUV I saw a medical center van park itself. I walked over and spoke to the driver. He said if I continued north I would soon come to the freeway but there had been a bad accident on the freeway and traffic was backed up for miles. He suggested I go back somewhat the way I had come in the morning. If I had asked the clerks or other not-immediately-driving folk they probably would not have known about the accident and traffic backup.

I went back the way I’d come in the morning. I was glad I had driven the route just this morning. When I got back to where I-10 approached the highway I was on I could see the long line of backed-up traffic. Vehicles were moving at 5miles an hour or less. I decided not to try to find my way back to L-101 but to turn on Hwy 87 and continue up to the northern part of Loop-202, then use it for a few miles. Two hours driving to get home.

Heard Museum Taste

SVM had made a deal with The Heard Museum so we SVM volunteers could get in free for the day and have a 45 minute tour by a Heard Volunteer Tour Guide. Those of us who did not work part time or were not already otherwise set up for the day arrived at the Heard the morning of April 18, 2024.

I can count on one hand the times I have been to the Heard since I moved to this area. I had not realized that the Heard deals mostly with relatively recent Native American paraphernalia. There were only a very few items pre-1900. But the Heard collects the best of the best. Some exhibits give the visitor a glimpse into changes in Native ideas during the “recent” past. Because I deal with much older artifacts at SVM I noticed the newness of the Heard’s collections early during our tour. The Heard is worth visiting for what it exhibits and the explanatory signs that go with much of the material. In this blog you will see only a small fraction of what is in the Heard’s exhibit cases and you will not see any representation of some areas because I ran out of energy.

If you don’t have time to enjoy a long blog, read this a piece at a time, noting where you leave off each day. If you have plenty of time, settle in your favorite comfortable chair and enjoy.

This sign greets the visitor at the Central Avenue entrance.

The “hm” at the left is the logo. The two letters each have a horizontal slash.

This yucca plant was just beginning to open its blossoms.

While this agave was in full swing. The agave only grow one flowering stalk in their lifetime and they pour all their sugars and growth nutrients into the stalk and flowers, and the leaves begin to die.

One of the entrance signs. I followed the up-to-the-left arrow and went inside the grounds.

There were a half dozen benches with mosaic tile work on top.

This is the amphitheater where the annual hoop dance contests are held, weather permitting. The slope down to the dance area is actually steeper than it looks in the foto. Visitors sit on the grass or bring their own folding chairs and set them on the grass.

Not all the art work is indoors.

Notice that the dress looks European-American but the woman is wearing Native American necklace and belt.

The creators of the sculpture below are an Eskimo tribe. The Eskimo tribes plus an Athabascan-speaking group remained in Alaska and northern Canada. I presume the rest of North America was teeming with earlier immigrants and the Eskimos and accompanying Athabascans had to remain in the cold country.

The Spanish is barely visible: “No tocar o subirse.”

The website https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/services/art-monuments/public-art/inukshuk.html states: “The word ‘iinukshuk’ means ‘in the likeness of a human.’ For generations, Inuit have been creating these impressive stone markers on the vast Arctic landscape. Inukshuks serve several functions, including guiding travellers [sic; this was the kind of spelling I was taught in public school], warning of danger, assisting hunters and marking places of reverence.”

I gathered with other SVM volunteers and we waited in the front entrance courtyard until the museum opened. The fountain is more than a piece of display. A gardener who was tending the potted plants put a bucket under the flow of water, filled the bucket, and used it to water some potted plants.

The museum entrance.

I like Alan Houser’s sculptures.

I wore my SVM volunteer ID so Heard employees would know I was a guest for the day. I affixed the Heard circle which meant that my entrance fee for the day had been paid. I’ve notice many museums are using this kind of paid-entrance sticky thing.

One of the first things I saw when entering the Main Gallery exhibit area was this display of shell jewelry. In each artifact cart at SVM we have pieces of broken bracelets and some new, unstrung tubular shells. Sometimes poeple don’t understand when I explain how the bracelets are made so I have printed this page and will take it with me each day I am at the artifact cart.

The Spanish brought playing cards with them (bottom row). The Indians saw the Spanish playing card games and manufactured their own set of playing cards. I believe the tour guide said the top row were made by Diné.

The inspiraiton for this line of glass sculpture was ocotillo stalk fences used by the natives, to protect their gardens for instance.

The artists apparently left the interpretation of the rainbow-like progression of colors up to each viewer. I see the sequence as starting at dawn and continuing until the sun just sets under the horizon. Some people see the day as progressing in the opposite direction.

“Havasu” means “blue-green water.” “Pai” means “people.” As you can see in the waterfall picture, the still water is blue-green.

At left is a cradleborad; at right is a burden basket. I’m not sure how the Havasupai carried this particular basket.

https://www.newmexicomagazine.org/blog/post/in-harvey-heaven-89250/: The Fred Harvey company art collection was donated to the Heard Museum in Phoenix (which got the Indian art and corporate files) and the Museum of International Folk Art in Santa Fe (which got the Spanish Colonial pieces). But much of the history resided in the memories of older family members. Stewart Harvey, Jr.—Fred’s first great-grandchild, with the furthest-back company experience—was the go-to historian on business and family matters. Anthropologist Byron Harvey III was the expert on Native art and the company’s dealings with generations of artists (along with his historian wife, Joy). Daggett Harvey, Jr. (who worked for the company and inherited his father’s historical research) and Helen Harvey Mills (the family photo researcher) were excellent resources, as was Julian Harvey. Between them, and the Santa Fe Harveys, they also had amazing memorabilia—starting with Fred’s photos and datebooks from the 1860s. (Much of that material has been donated to the New Mexico History Museum.)

Byron Harvey III was a classmate of my husband’s. Byron had graduated from UNM and also completed his Master’s in anthropology somewhere by the time I entered UNM. My husband and I accidentally met up with him a few years later in a restaurant. He was working as a curator in a museum. My memory tries to tell me that Byron III was a direct descendant of Fred Harvey. But my memory of details from the late 1960s is sometimes incorrect.

We sat down at the table with Byron III. During our lunch and chat it seems to me that Byron said the family fortunes had largely dissipated by the time he was born. That might explain why the museum-quality things all went to museums; family could no longer afford to take good care of them.

I admire the Havasupai basket maker who was able to weave such delightful designs into the basket below.

The Museum of Northern Arizona offers this info on its web site: “The term Hualapai means “People of the Tall Pines” and is derived from Xawalapaiya or “pine tree people.” The Hualapai people live in the high desert and pinon-juniper forest south of the western Grand Canyon.”

This is/was a winnowing basket.

The basket above would be over a hundred years old.

I have taken this picture of an entire display in order to help the reader have a good idea of the size of the basket at lower left.

This is a closeup of the basket.

And this sign tells an interesting story. During our tour the guide mentioned a number of tpes of things that were created, beginning in the 1800s, merely to sell to tourists as a source of income for the indigenous people of the Southwest.

Wikipedia says: “The Yavapai (/ˈjævəˌpaɪˌ/ YA-və-pye) are a Native American tribe in Arizona. Historically, the Yavapai – literally ‘people of the sun’ (from Enyaava ‘sun’ + Paay ‘people’)”

The dictionaries say the word “Yavapai” means: 1: a member of a Native America tribe living in Arizona, and 2. the Yuman language of the Yavapai.

This site, http://www.nativepartnership.org/site/PageServer?pagename=PWNA_Native_Reservations_Yavapai says: The Yavapai called themselves Enyaeva, which had mixed meanings. Some think it meant “people of the sun,” while others claim it meant “crooked mouth people.”

I guess the meaning of the original word depends on whether you are friend or foe.

But the craftsmen/women make beautiful baskets.

The above basket is definitely over 100 years old.

The basket below was made by a descendant of the people who lived at S’edav Va’aki.

And is over 100 years old. I wonder if the person who purchased this basket from the craftsperson paid anything near what it was worth in terms of beauty, craftsmanship, and time involved in weaving it.

Again, I have taken a large picture to try to give you an idea of the size of the basket-with-lid in the center. The mortar and pestle are also large; larger than what we buy today for hand-grinding spices in our kitchens.

A closeup to show the type of weaving.

The ancient southern Arizona people grew a type of wheat, but did not grow much of it. The Europeans (apparently the Spanish) brought seeds of our modern wheat. These plants grew well and produced well, and became a major crop of the O’Odham.

This is an O’Odham burden basket. Notice the poles to make it sturdy. I think the strap hanging down may have been used to affix the basket around the forehead.

There may have been a trick to hanging the basket from one’s forehead so that the edges of the sticks did not rub one’s skin raw.

The object of this foto is the openwork semi-circular piece of women’s clothing. Mohave women, and probably women of other tribes along the lower Colorado River, wore skirts but did not wear upper body coverings. European women were offended and insisted that the Mohave women cover themselves. These semicircular pieces were made just long enuf to cover the woman’s breasts. If you think it looks too small, remember that it was rare for a woman of these tribes to be even five feet tall.

These days the whatever-they-are-called items are worn with lovely dresses for special occasions.

The tour guide said that Native Americans began weaving pictures of religious meaning and of daily life in order to preserve their heritage.

I took a picture of the “Ye’ii bichei” rug, but apparently there was more to “this textile” than just the religious scene.

The katsina display is the only place where a huge collection of like objects was displayed. This may have been because each “doll” represents the craftperson’s idea of what the spirit would look like if it could be seen by human eyes.

These two katsina dolls were made between 1870 and 1910. They often were made more for teaching (the katsina on the right) than as objects of art. Note the pale colors of dyes made from items of nature. But when the Hopi realized tourists and collectors were eager to buy the dolls they began making the figures in greater detail and started using bright store-bought paints.

Now this display, below, is interesting. Twig Johnson, who is a retired archaeologist and a volunteer at SVM, thus was part of today’s tour group, said that the man wove the white blanket-like garment for his bride to wear as a wedding dress. But the wife kept the dress and it was also her burial gown a few decades later. (These people had short life spans.)

And . . . . Twig said the bride’s mother made a (relatively simple) basket for her son-in-law-to-be. During the ceremony the older woman would hand the basket to the new son-in-law and tell him that by this gesture she was throwing away all negative thoughts she had about him and was starting a life of good thoughts about him.

The sash must be in a portion of the display that I did not take a picture of.

This is apparently representative of a relatively simple basket the bride’s mother would have made.

The walls and ceiling of the hogan replica are built in typical Diné style. I’m not sure the doorway is traditional.

Inside detail showing how the rounded roof is put together.

Below, the white objects in a circle are reflections from a chandelier that hung in the hogan. Obviously, traditional hogans did not have electric lights and often still do not have electricity. But the museum wanted the visitors to be able to study the details of construction well. With such good lighting, they hung this piece of very detailed sandpainting in the room, also. The artist probably created it with the backboard lying flat. Some sort of colorless glue would have been added to hold the design together.

After reading the information below go back up to look at the sand painting. You can discern the five worlds (the first one is at the bottom) but I don’t see the reed that was used to climb to the fifth world.

Believe it or not, this is a canteen. A tiny canteen. Little canteens like this were apparently used to carry tobacco (sacred tobacco).

Beautiful silversmith inlay.

More of an overview.

And here are the silversmiths.

Speaking of canteens, that is a water canteen at the right below. Again, I have taken a picture of the larger display to give you an idea of the size of the canteen. It was a little more than a foot tall.

Now, take into thought the fact that it is made of pottery and the weight of the pottery. Think of the strength and endurance it would take for a person to carry this canteen full of water on a walk of many miles

I wonder who C. G. Wallace is.

Zunis make beautiful bowls and jars, but they also make storytelling figurines.

The scaly feathers on the owl on the left took patience and practice.

You will find out why I included this piece of faux glass in a couple frames.

I am amazed at the ability of the person who did the painting on the pot at left, the ability to change the sizes of the flowers to match the changing shapes of the bowl and keep them all in proportion. The bowl on the right also took a very skilled artist.

Now you learn about that piece of white stuff two pictures above. I could not take a picture of the descriptions of numbers 6 and 7 just by themselves, so I took this picture then moved to my left and took the picture of the selenite.

Fantastic painter!

The tour guide said an horno for baking bread in today’s pueblos will be three times the size of this demonstration model. My mother loved the taste of bread baked in these ovens and bought it whenever she could.

These do not belong to a modern cartoon character.

There were a necessary piece of winter wearing apparel.

I have to cut off this blog at this point. Word Press tells me I have reached the maximum pictures I can put in a blog. More will come in a blog on another day.

Quick Update on Improving My Balance

April 9 was my second visit with the balance therapist. Again, I underwent an hour of testing. The results were discouraging. Test on the ability of my eyes, inner ears, and proprioceptors on the bottoms of my feet tested normal; they are functioning well. My problems with balance are all due to weakening of muscles. This is discouraging because I’m not sure I can re-build enuf muscle mass to be able to balance well when walking.

The machine beloe was used for much of the testing. It reminds me of a Native American, probably Apache, dancer’s mask. The light slits are eyes so the dancer can see where he is going, the horizontal purple strip that stands out is a nose. The black is the headdress over forehead extending above the top of the dancer’s head. At least, that is my interpretation. The colored walls look like an impressionist painting by a Native American.

Alas, it is a prosaic modern machine. The black headdress is a screen upon which pictures can be shown. There was a written document displayed on it for testing the patient who had just used the room. My therapist removed the picture. For my tests she used a hand-held device to rock the painted sides back and forth a little, and to cause the dotted things my feet stood on to move up and down, tilting a little. When the therapist allowed me to keep my eyes open I hardly noticed the moving walls and the tilting feet stands. But when she told me to keep my eyes closed. . . . I almost could not remain standing. But the machine calculated my response as being normal for a person ages 71 to 79. The machine did not have data for anyone older than 79.

This chart shows the results of simultaneous testing of eyes and inner ears. I was above average.

This chart shows the results of testing my eyes.

Remember, in another recent blog, the cart showing the parts of the inner ear with typing so small we could not read about the parts? I took pictures of sections of that chart today and am putting them at the end of this blog in case some of you want to read the inner ear chart.

I had very little to blog about my balance testing today so I decided to add some other interesting pictures.

Today I dropped by my branch library and saw this 4-wheeled traveling contraption. This person must be a dedicated traveler. With very strong legs.

True West magazine for March-April 2024 has this etymology of the word “dude.” I thought you might find it as interesting as I did.

Then I added some fotos I had taken in recent past months.

This car was advertising the Arizona Lottery. It was parked at the QT where I buy gas and even more frequently buy iced tea.

Candy roses at Walgreens last October. Did you buy any?

Dogcatcher truck and police car last October. I had not seen a dogcatcher’s vehicle in many years.

Chinese Pistach trees in fall colors last Xmas Eve. 6th Avenue near my dwelling.

A T-shirt I saw this March.

I thought the stick figure was down in hell but the wearer said the shirt is referring to climate change and that we will all soon be burning.

This year I had to go for help with my income taxes. Several years ago Travis Jack, who now owns our Unit 4, purchased the Metz CPA company. He and it have been successful and he has added a couple new branch offices. This, however, is the motto on the wall of the parking lot of the main office which is just a few blocks from our condominium. Travis’ mother had bought Unit 4 and worked the front desk for Travis. She died unexpectedly of cancer throughout her body spring 2023, less than 2 months after the cancer was diagnosed. She was about 56 years young.

The man in the fotograph on the animal’s chest is the Mr. Metz who established the company.

Travis’ company no longer does individual income tax returns but the desk clerk referred me to a private CPA who had worked for Travis (and Mr. Metz) for a number of years.

The inner ear chart for those of you who want to try to study and read it.

Camp Verde Cute Vacation

Lynda and I had long planned this outing but had to wait til she had a couple days free. At 6:00 AM Satruday morning April 6, 2024 she picked me up at my condo and we drove to the little tourist town of Camp Verde.

Was it officially a “fort” or a “camp” back in 1865?

We arrived hungry but nothing was open yet! We stopped to take fotographs of this mural.

It was very eye-catching. Fortunately, Lynda likes murals as well as I do so she was not averse to stopping.

Because of the time I spend volunteering for and at S’edav Va’aki Museum and spend reading erudite tomes in SVM’s library, I decided to enlarge this bit at upper left of the large mural. The Ancient Sonoran Desert people lived in wickiups, ground corn and other things on using manos on metates, and caught and ate fish.

After studying the mural we noticed that this sign near the street pertained to the building with the mural. We walked around to the front and saw a couple waiting for the 8 AM opening in five minutes. I asked if the breakfast here was good and the couple said it was. At 8 AM we followed the couple inside. There was a case with a dozen varieties of fresh sweet things like Danish pastry. The blackboard behind the counter listed drinks. Nowhere was there mention of real breakfast, so we left. Later, at the Routist Information Center was saw a menu for Thank’s a Latte café. Breakfasts and lunches were included. Lynda remarked about the inability of the staff at this café to communicate in full with what is written or on display.

While waiting for 8 AM I had taken a picture of this alien creature looking thing. Cute, isn’t he?

We drove a little farther and decided to try Shirley’s Kitchen at the old Montezuma Inn.

Shirley was apparently a brand new owner of the historic building.

This sign stood outside the building. When we were inside I asked the waiter if the building had been empty for a while. He said it had sat empty several times in its lifetime as it went from alsoon to inn to restaurant, maybe more than once.

Sheila’s menus looked good, tasty, and priced within our pocketbooks.

I ordered the bacon omelet with side orders of hash browns and English muffin. The omelet had a small coating of melted cheese on top. The ingenuity of how the bacon was “crumbled” was interesting. Slice the bacon in thin strips then fry it. Ready-made “crumbled” bacon. I like the idea very much; so I plan to remember it.

This picture hanging on a wall reminded me to be thankful for the warmth of building’s insides and the protection from the wind. The temperature was in the low 50’s outside with a stiff enuf breeze to go thru our clothes. When doing things like fotographing the mural we had momentarily lost feeling of the cold, but quickly had begun lightly shivering when the enjoyable event was completed.

I am still wondering whether this was someone’s actual VW Bug in the 1960s and -70s, or if it was a painter’s fancy. The use of color and eyelashes is great composition. To me, anyway.

This motto hung on the wall at the enrtyway. True, isn’t it?

The sign is pointing in the correct direction. The slot where the carving is sitting might have originally held a transom window that could have been opened to encourage movement of air, before a/c was invented.

The doors to the kitchen were so well worn I wondered if they might date from 1900.

While we were waiting for our breakfasts to be cooked this group of young people came in, ordered, then began playing cards (they gave a name that indicated they were playing poker). Lynda said, “That is what my family does when we gather for food, even when in a restaurant! Play cards!” (Her stated that her family played things like Rummy at short-time intervals like this.) (Bridge when they had time to be serious.)

After filling our very hungry stomachs we decided to visit the Tourist Information Center to get directions and ideas of what might be seen that we did not already know about, and to get driving directions.

Look who the “artists” were. Carpenters.

The Tourist Info Ctr resided in an old school building.

This mural in the entryway looked quite new.

While waiting for the tourist-museum bldg to open we read the set of signs posted outside.

Since my teenage years I have read about the “Long Walk” of the Navajos (from around the Canyon de Chelly area to Fort Sumner, New Mexico), but I’d never heard of the Long Walk of the Yavapai and Apache people. In the second line of the explanatory paragraph in this sign I originally read “the goo-square-mile” and I wondered what “goo” squares were.

The descendants of the occupants of S’edav Va’aki lived in wickiups. The earliest pithouses may have been wickiups.

This picture is probably from the early 1900s. Notice that the top of the wickiup has the water-proof covering that an older O’Odham man recently described to me: a layer of fresh creosote boughs; a layer of mud; a second layer of fresh creosote; and a second layer of mud. The O’Odham man said this was good water proofing.

Look how tall their corn plants grew! Is that as Easter Bunny in the woman’s arms? Or a Jack Russell terrier?

I’d never heard of this long, long geological fault. From the Black Hills of South Dakota down into the Verde River in Arizona.

The Verde River once originated near the Black Hills of South Dakota!

Mining of the salt in this area ended in the 1930s, but it lives on in local memory.

As we wandered to different places I took pictures and, when we were seated, such as at meals, Lynda wrote sentences and paragraphs. I would like to see lYnd’as written impressions.

Lynda and I both wished the plaque had included the birth and death years of this woman. Perhaps the Camp Verde town library has a biography about Ms. Hallett.

I like the fancifulness and the color of this mural.

And this one, also. Don’t know who the tile artist was.

This festival would be the next weekend but preparations were already visible. Lynda made a note to mark her calendars to attend this reenactment festival in future years. I think it would be both interesting and fun.

Second week in April ornamentation.

When we were in the tourist bureau we were told about this festival taking place this day. We added it to our list and walked over to the city gymnasium building.

A great wall painting for a gym.

I thought this warning was sort of funny; surprised that it was necessary. It starts off with soft gloved then makes a punch with the last line.

I was pleasantly surprised to see this permanent mural on a gym wall, an acknowledgment and acceptance of sexual diversity. The coyote and roadrunner are looking at a sign that says “Let go of a dark past so your future can be brighter.” The word “brighter” is in rainbow colors.

I’d never seen any picture of a treadle spinning wheel like this one. Notice that the woman is twisting pieces of yarn together with her fingers.

A close-up of her hands and the yarn strands moving to become thread.

I took this picture of things in motion. You can sort of see that the yarn leaving her fingers is at least two pieces loosely twisted together.

This woman had served in the Peace Corps (probably in the1960s) in Ecuador. She said the natives gathered aplaca wool by brushing the animals, not by shearing them.

The fabrics and the inlaid circles were all made by children with disabilities. The profits apparently went to the organization helping the youth. The artist of this piece of inlay had apparently been taught that owls were a bad omen, an omen often of death. This belief is held by several Native American tribes while some others see the owl as a good, benign member of the mammal family (four-legged, two-legged, and winged).

A tree sale was going on in front of this building. One gallon bucket trees down to smaller trees ready to be planted in the ground.

The building is the 1933 stone jail.

Before touring the fiber festival, and later in the morning, we had selected brochures from inside the tourism bldg and studied the items in the historical museum in the other room of the of school.

Because this painting hangs in the historical museum I think it may have been painted early in the career of the store.

Below is a good drawing of what the Ancient Sonoran Desert People’s (Hohokam) field irrigation might have looked like. There is an open headgate where a canal leaves the main irrigation canal and an open headgate allowing water to infiltrate the garden or field. The water runs between rows of plants where it will soak the ground and the roots of the crops but not injure the tender plants, themselves.

Does it look to you like the black dog has the head of a pig? Maybe my fantasies are simply running wild.

This museum is closed on Sundays so we drove to it next. This brand-new building opened November 26, 2021.

There was a small old car show in the parking lot. When I saw this blue pickup I thought of Gene’s vehicle and I looked around for Gene. However, when I saw that the cab had not yet been restored or repainted I knew it was not Gene’s vehicle, altho it was a Chevrolet.

This is Gene’s partly restored pickup; it is an El Camino Chevrolet not a standard pickup.

Standing outside the building I took a picture of the logo of the Verde Valley Archaeological Museum. To my delight, nothing inside the building showed up in the foto, but me and the parking lot and the old car show did.

Borrowed exhibits are displayed in the gallery the visitor first enters. Today the display was of artifacts on loan from the Grand Canyon National Monument museum. I don’t know who provided the two large pictures hanging on the wall.

Oar probably from John Wesley Powell’s Grand Canyon trip August 1869.

Ancient sandals.

Interesting comments about the sandals.

Notice the progression from small corncobs near the bottom up to longer, larger cobs. I’ve never seen a display of large cobs among prehistoric food items. I’ve always wondered why the European colonists found the small cobs worth cultivating when they must have brought a large array of seeds from Europe with them.

Paul Dyck was an artist who owned a plot of land just under the Mogollon Rim and worked to preserve the prehistoric artifacts on his land. His descendants donated funds to help build this new museum building.

The museum gves people’s years. Dyck lived 89 years and left some wonderful things for posterity.

He courted friendships with Native Americans and they and/or their cultures were often in his paintings. He obviously liked to wear American Western clothes, himself.

Lynda and I tried to figure out how the unusual buttons were made. Possibly small strips of the leather were folded carefully, then sewn onto the vest.

Paul is the man on the left, wearing the above vest. Notice that the buttons are on the wrong side. Someone flipped the negative before printing the picture.

To me this stone looks like a horse’s head facing to the left. It has a manget attached.

And this is why. The magnet is not glued to the meteorite; is held by magnetism.

We had intended to visit the Crane Petroglyph Heritage Site this afternoon but we ran out of time and energy. This sign in the archaeological museum was very interesting.

Bottom portion of sign.

We did not make it to the Crane Petroglyph site today but we have plans for the future. . . .

No date was given for this burden basket but since it is being displayed in the archaeological museum I presume it is from pre-European intrusion days. I could be wrong. It does not look as tho it sat buried in dirt for centuries or even only decades, but modern cleaning methods might have restored it. A sign near it says “Havasupai Burden Basket. Gift of Eliza Kennedy Kendall.”

This basket definitely shows signs of aging in a mound of heavy dirt.

The sign for this basket. Notice the black pitch (sap) on the outside of the basket, above. The picth made the basket water-tight.

Here is another progression of corn cobs. I suppose that across hundreds of years the anicent people could have produced plants that grew larger and larger corn cobs, simply by saving seeds from largest cobs each year and planting them the next year. But I’d never seen a display in a museum or in a book that indicated that the ancient Native Americans had developed corn with large cobs.

These Acacia pods were in the “Gathering and Farming” display. I assume that this display was of items eaten by the early inhabitants of Arizona but I had not yet read anything about their eating acacia pods. I wonder if they ate green pods as is, like we eat modern green beans, and also ground the dried pods and seeds to make flour, just as the ancient inhabitants did with mesquite beans.

Our next objective lay beside the Salt Mine Road. This spot looks as tho it had been the salt quarry. The abnormal pure white color of the mound at first made me think that this pile had been quarried and treated but never taken to market. However, the “treating” spot for the salt was said to be a short ways away from here.

We saw a parking lot and a well built toilet so Lynda pulled in into the parking lot. Each of us paused to take a foto of this signboard after first inspecting the inside of the toilet building.

The white mound of salt is slightly to the left of the electricity pole. The Verde Formation is the off-white stuff going to the right away from the pure white salt.

The rocks delineating parking and no-parking areas seemed to be from the Verde Formation of ancient salt beds.

We had about given up finding this two-month-old state park. The distance indicated on the road from town to the park must have been incorrect on the map. Until the state park was officially created this area was apparently called the Blue Heron Preserve by local people and birdwatchers.

Here is the Rockin’ River Ranch State Park mailbox.

The land was originally a large, prosperous ranch. This barn was built by one of the ranch owners. At the moment the state park does not seem to own any animals to be put in the barn and associated pens, much less rangers with knowledge and time to take care of animals.

The scenery is distinctive. The white line at the bottom of the mesa on right horizon is a large number of greenhouses on private property. We never actually saw the river today (the Verde River). The cottonwood trees along the banks were too thick.

I was so interested in the next fotograph that I forgot to watch the ground. I tripped over this concrete parking boundary, below, and fell hard on knees, right thigh, and back of right hand. I lay still for a moment but nothing was giving off pain so I sat up, then stood up, by myself. I was surprised and I said to the young ranger who had approached asking if he could help me, “My bones are stronger than concrete!” Later, I explained to Lynda that even tho I have severe osteoporosis I have a lot of fluoride in my bones and the fluoride has been preventing my bones from breaking when I fall or otherwise injure tissue adjacent to bones; and the endocrinologist agrees.

I did have a little bit of broken skin. One small, slightly bloody scrape on my left knee (trousers not torn), one bruise just below my right knee, and two copiously bleeding one-inch splits in the skin of the back of my right hand. The skin had split simply from the force of hitting the concrete when I fell. Fluoride in the skin does not prevent skin from breaking. You say any fluoride that entered my skin while I was drinking very, very highly fluoridated water as a child and teenager in Lubbokc, Texas, would have sloughed off with the skin over the years? Well, this intuitive thought is incorrect. The slightly yellow color of my skin comes from overdoses of DDT and fluoride, and the color has existed ever since I was about seven years old.

Readers are probably thinking this blog is never going to end. It is ending. Soon. But. . . . come to think of it, we are taught that skin cells are replaced often and that cells in inner tissues and organs are replaced over and over during our lifetime, how do the yellow stain of my skin and the color of body tattoos rmeain forever? (I hope you enjoy that accidental anagram.)

Ranch dinner bell.

State Park fire hydrant.

A ranger had told us to sit down and watch the sycamore tree. Eventually we would see one or more owner, Great Blue Herons. Lynda saw both. Orne bird raised her body up out of her nest briefly while I was looking off in a different direction and I did not see her.

After a while this bird stood up. She (and the bird in the other nest) had apparently been incubating their eggs. This bird remained standing on the edge of her nest and seemed to be preening her feathers and cleaning the interior of the nest.

This is why I bought the Nikon camera with good telefoto lens. Note the long chest feathers.

A small house once sat at the top of this staircase. Probably the original, permanent homesteader ranch house. Notice the circular rock flower planter at lower right. Lynda is standing beside a similar flower planter. Someone took time and effort to build the wide walkway and stairs very carefully. The rock walls holding the soil off the stairway has held up well but does not look professional.

It was well after 3 o’clock and we had not eaten since breakfast. We consulted brochures we had acquired about a few eateries. The place we would have liked to eat at had closed at 2 PM today, Satruday. (It was open til 7 PM week nights.) So we went searching for our second best choice. It was not easy to find, but eventually we pulled into the parking lot of La Fonda of Camp Verde.

We had picked up this paper menu at the toruist info center. Notice that there is a fone number for ordering food to pick up, but no address, no hint of address. Altho the cover does give the information of “Sorry, No Personal Checks Accepted.”

The food was good and we both ordered dishes that were accompanied by one sopapilla each. This is the first time I have seen sopapillas in Arizona. They are beautifully made. The owners possibly are from Mexico. The two waitresses, sisters, spoke broken English. We asked for butter instead of honey and two small packets of real butter were brought to our table. It is rare to find real butter at decently-priced restaurants. Using chemical imposters is usually one of the restaurant’s cost-saving measures. The owners of the two restaurants we ate at today were proud enuf of their food that they would not sully it with chemical mixtures labeled as “butter.”

Earlier, in the morning, we had received Breakfast English muffins at Shirley’s with real butter provided.

Now that I’ve buttered you up I’ll let you go.

Improving My Balance

Somewhere in my talk about dizziness I had mentioned to a doctor or two that I have not been able to walk a straight line for several years when taking walks such as to the local grocery store. Tests by cardiology, neurology, and otology showed no physical problem that would affect my walking balance, except that during the tests where air was blown into my ears one at a time, the left ear had better performance than the right ear. I know I hear better with my left ear. Then the ear doctor ordered balance therapy.

So on April 2, 2024 I set out to walk to the therapist’s office. When I had made the appointment the clerk had told me Balance Therapy was on the third floor of Building 240. She described Building 240 as being at 3rd Avenue and Thomas, on the south side of Thomas, and she (the clerk) could see a parking garage from her window. The description did not make sense, but the clerk hotly told me she had worked there for something like 12 years and she knew where Building 240 was. She again said it was at Thrid Avenue and Thomas.

Since 3rd Ave and Thomas is only a couple blocks from my condo I set out on foot. Distances in central Phoenix are compressed. There is no Fourth Avenue, and the distance from 5th Ave to 3rd Ave is only one short block. I crossed Earll at the SW corner of our condominium property and strolled down 6th Avenue which curved and became 5th Avenue. There was a stop light at 5th Ave and Thomas but the way Phoenix is numbered 240 should be on the north side of Thomas, so I crossed 3rd Ave and but did not cross Thomas. In a few yards I was nearly to 3rd Avenue and I saw that the building in front of me (on the east side of Third, north side of Thomas) was the Lonnie and Muhammad Ali Parkinson’s Center. I ran my eyes along the side of the building and found a large sign saying “240.” Why hadn’t the clerk told me Building 240 was the Mohammad Ali building? I had walked the long way to get there, going a short block out of my way. I reminded myself that I needed the exercise.

In the foto below the man has just come out the front door and the door is still open. This statue greest all visitors and staff.

Read the full title of the building carefully. The “Excellence” was granted one month before I moved into my condo.

When I stepped off the elevator on the third floor I walked down a hall different than the hall I walked when I had the neurological testing in this building.

Muhammad Ali in action. This seemed to be a painting, not superimposed fotographs.

I love the use of color in this “Bridges” painting.

The words in the sun at upper left are “Visión y compromiso.”

The second paragraph in this essay calls the above picture a “digital art piece,” but it goes on to explain that it is a collage of fotographs of pieces of paintings done by. . . .

From the words on the door a visitor would think they were in the Barrow Neurological Institute building rather than the Mohammad Ali Research Center. The truth is, the Lonnie and Muhammad Parkinson’s Center Building 240 is part of the Barrow Neurological Institute. But signs like this that do not allude to Ali at all are confusing.

Yes, Muhammad Ali lived in Phoenix in later years and his wife, Lonnie, still lives in the area.

This sign was in the check-in area. It alludes to Muhammad Ali without words. This foto was obviously taken in the northern US. I have never seen a room heating unit like the ne at lower left in the Southwest but I do remember seeing them (and burning my curious finger) in Chicago when we visited mother’s oldest sister.

I wonder if this poster advertises Ali’s boxing motto. Do any of you boxing fans know?

The check-in clerk had decorated for Easter. She has the bunny’s second ear but has not yet gotten around to glueing it back on.

This is a fascinating chart. I’m sorry the writing is too small for us to read.

A very nice young female therapist spent most of an hour having me do various things so she could see my problems. The scariest test was when she had me fold my arms across my chest, close my eyes, then walk forward. It was also the most difficult. The therapist had her hands very near my sides to catch me if I started to fall.

She told me my right leg is a shade longer than my left leg and this probably gives me some problem when walking. She took two pictures to show me. I asked her to forward them to my email.

I tried to put the next two fotos side by side but I couldn’t. Perhaps you can scroll down so that they will both show in your monitor at the same time.

The first is the “before” picture. If you look closely you can see that my belt drops slightly lower on my left side. The droop is actually more visible in the mirror than in the picture.

This is the “after” picture, after she taped a one-eighth-inch lift to the heel of my left sandal.

If the lift does not cause undue pain in my hips or legs I will wear heel lifts in my left shoes for the rest of my life. And I will no longer go barefoot in the house, because walking around a good part of the day without the heel lift would confuse my brain. The therapist gave me a heel insert to tape to my house slipper at home.

Next week she will start teaching me exercises, and maybe other things. She is already expecting to give me 8 therapy sessions (one a week), and can add more if necessary.

Walking home (using the more direct route) was a little easier than walking to the Center had been.

Sidewalk vandalism.

My left house slipper with heel insert.

This is the largest size I was able to transfer the foto. Still can’t read it.

SVM At DVPP

It seems that Deer Valley Petroglyph Preserve likes to have one or two community-involved organizations staffing a table each weekend. On March 30, 2024 S’edav Va’aki moved their table outside in the sunshine while the Flood Control District of Maricopa County table and staffers stayed inside.

Brittlebush were in full bloom, but the ironwood tree either had already dropped its seeds or had not blossomed.

Right away, in the parking lot, we learn that ASU plays an important role in this preserve.

The entrance area to the museum (visitors center) and more beautiful yellow brittlebushes.

The two deer greeting each other is the logo for the Preserve.

This gives a better look at the logo. Why are the deer colored yellow and green in this foto and not in the other? It is because the deer are cut out of the rusty sign and when I walked closer to take this foto the angle of the camera changed and a different nature-background showed thru.

The Preserve calls them Kissing Deer. The actual petroglyph is in the lower right corner of the rock in the foto.

For those of you planning to visit.

General$14Seniors (62+), Military, AAA,
AARP ($1 discount)$13Children (7-12) $5Children (6 and younger) FreeMembers, ASU students,
Indigenous Peoples (w/ tribal ID) Free

Trash can made of same rusty metal as other parts of the museum.

I’m not sure why the name has changed since this plate was affixed to the wall of the m,useum.

Some of you may recognize this fellow.

John is a reflection in this picture below. He is not actually painted into the poster.

John explained that the architect for the museum had been a student of a student of Frank Lloyd Wright. This long “hall” is the display portion of the museum. The long, narrow “room” represents funneling visitors thru explanations and out into the world of real petroglyphs.

I have left this full-sized so perhaps you can read all the writing.

Ditto

Adult chuckwallas are large enuf t take a bite out of your foot. But they won’t hurt you if all you do is stare at them.

Informative sign.

Here is my foto of the rock in the sign above. Isn’t my selfie interesting? Interestingly shaped.

What a beautiful reptile!

A bit of the museum’s history.

Petroglyph Mountain top left and colorful lichen lower right.

Musings.

What petroglyph artist could resist this pile of rocks?

I didn’t take any pictures of the tubes themselves but I looked thru a few to see what petroglyphs they were highlighting, then I took pictures of the etched rocks on the hillside.

Wikipedia says: “The Patayan tradition is often divided into three phases. Patayan I (AD 700–1050) witnessed the arrival of pottery-using agricultural communities along the Colorado River. During Patayan II (1050–1500), this material culture spread outward to southern Nevada, western Arizona, and to the Salton Sea.” I wonder what happened during Patayan III?

Archaeologysouthwest.org has written: “Pataya (pah-tah-yáh) is a word of the Pai branch (Hualapai, Havasupai, Yavapai, and Paipai) of the Yuman-Cochimí language family that translates loosely as “old people.”

“As used by archaeologists, Pataya refers to a specific material culture spread throughout western Arizona, southern California, southern Nevada, and Baja California. What makes Patayan material culture a unique archaeological pattern is a series of distinctive pottery forms and wares, specific motifs and embellishments in petroglyphs and pictographs, the creation and use of intaglios and geoglyphs, and a geographic focus on the lower Colorado River.

“Interestingly, the spatial extent of Patayan material culture does map onto the historic distribution of the Yuman languages, which is why many believe this archaeological tradition is ancestral to historic and contemporary Yuman-speaking tribes. Nevertheless, archaeologists have long recognized regional variation, or “branches,” within the Patayan tradition based on differences in settlement patterns, ways of making a living (subsistence practices), and nuances in material culture (what people made and built). This has led to considerable debate and confusion—what archaeologist Harold Colton called “the Patayan problem” 75 years ago.

“Pataya remains one of the least-studied late pre-contact (contact with Europeans) cultural traditions in the American Southwest. One reason for this is the lack of research carried out in this rather remote frontier of western Arizona and southeastern California. Another is the ephemeral nature of many remaining Patayan archaeological sites.”

I’d never heard of the Patayan Tradition. Not even in the erudite books I have been reading in the library at S’edav Va’aki.

I took this picture with the Nikon camera.

(Mis-)interpreting petroglyphs.

Before you leave this foto, look again at the rock in the center. This picture was taken by my cell fone camera. This was the best that camera could do to enlarge the rock, or bring it closer in.

With Nikon camera

After I had walked the trail and taken fotos I hurried back to my SUV and got my good Nikon camera. I only had a few minutes in which to take a very few fotos before we “opened our table to the public.

Cell fone camera.

With Nikon camera.

Cell fone camera. That’s a cute bunch of animals at the top just left of center. At top right are two humans holding hands. Lots of unintelligible squiggles on the rock just left of center.

Cell fone camera. I see at least eight rocks with petroglyphs.

Cell fone camera. Four snakes in a row sunning themselves on a rock.

Good question:

Interesting answer.

Cell fone took a picture of its own volition.

The flat-topped mesa-looking thing in the foto below is Adobe Dam.

Peter Heugel and I helped at the SVM table during the morning. Not too long ago Peter had volunteered for 8 years with DVPP because he only lived/lives two miles away. He explained that Adobe Dam, which was not many yards beyond the DVPP Visitor Center, was built to temporarily catch water when the skies are too ebullient and to let the captured excessive water run away in controlled amounts. He said the water from the “spillway” (at the base of the dam) runs in a conduit underneath the museum building. Before homeless people began living in the conduit when it was dry between rains and leaving a lot of trash in sight, visitors in the visitor center could look thru a transparent panel in the floor and watch dirty brown flood waters happily leaping and bouncing along. There is a video in the visitor center which shows what that used to look like.

How did this petroglyph of an ancient dinosaur turn white? Well, it was dropped by a bird invading the invasive Stink Net plant territory, Oncosiphon pilulifer plants.

Peter said the rock circle below was an agave heart roasting pit. He explained that he and other volunteers would remove the dirt and rocks from the pit and help roast agave hearts. The volunteers got to go along to collect agave hearts from a portion of Yavapai land. Each person involved would receive a blessing and be given some tobacco. Each time they removed an agave heart they sprinkled some tobacco at the site. Before the agave hearts were loaded for travel to DVPP an elder checked each plant carefully. If he found any pups (very young agave plants growing on the parent plant) he removed them.

Relatively small agave hearts were used. Maybe a foot in diameter. I’m wondering if the Yavapai are once again cultivating the Agave Murphyii the ancient Sonoran Desert People brought up from Mexico. Peter said that after roasting, the agave tasted like candy. He said each roasted heart looked like a large hunk of brown sugar.

Peter commented that he had once attended an agave roast at SVM. The heart had been quite large (two-or-more-feet-in-diameter) and tasted awful after roasting. Peter thinks SVM employees said the hearts were from “Blue Agave,.” On the Internet I see there are a number of agave called “blue agave.” At least one species can grow to seven feet tall (unlike Agave murphyii which only grows waist high). I suspect the ancient people did not eat the hearts of that blue agave plant and that they imported Agave murphyii because it was so sweet and delicious. They grew plantations of Agave murphyii.

Peter did not think the manos and metates on display beside the path came from the petroglyph area. They appear to have been set out by the museum to give people an idea of the difficulty of preparing meals at the time the petroglyph drawers lived (people who do art work, not pajama bottoms).

It is a bit difficult to see in the foto but this metate has four raised sides. It is a true artifact, probably from somewhere in southern Arizona.

This metate is missing two ends but it could have been a “trough metate,” ie with raised sides on only two sides.

This appeared to be a trough metate not much used thus the trough is shallow.

As far as I know metates with legs were never made north of the US-Mexico border.

Live things to watch for. You will probably see them slinking, running, or flying away from you. However, Peter said that one year there was a family of five coyotes that would walk on top of a small rise or walk high along the side of the hills, following tour groups walking the path. Each time the guide stopped to talk the coyotes would stop. The leader would put two paws on a rock and pose.

She bought the shirt on Amazon!

Three-fourths of a family making petroglyphs. Someone at SVM makes flat plaster of Paris rock chunks and paints them a red-brown. Long, sharp-pointed nails are provided for visitors to use for etching designs on the “rocks.”

John is full of ideas for improving the museum.

John was briefly education director at BTA. While he was wroking that job he volunteered at S’edav Va’aki by directing the Mudslingers.

DBG With Botero

During the last 5 days of cool weather I have been with friends in situations or sites worth blogging about. When the days get hot my blogs will be farther and farther apart.

Marilyn had not seen Botero’s art exhibit at the Desert Botanical Garden. Today, March 26, 2024 was very close to the end of the exhibit (March 31). As usual, I took pictures of things that caught my eye. I have put the fotos into this blog in the order in which I took the pictures but it is not in the order in which they lie in the garden. We walked in circles, not on purpose, at least twice.

This scarlet hedgehog greeted us just outside the entrance. In years past I often saw it in bloom in late spring well up the Six Shooter Trail in the Pinal Mountains on the south side of Globe, Arizona.

This lovely flower garden greeted us just inside the entrance. Desert penstemon and brittlebush and desert marigolds and a couple brochures that escaped human hands..

This is the artist whose works were just finishing a 6-month showing.

I showed this overemphasized lady in the DBG-Botero blog I wrote in February.

But I don’t think I showed her back side.

To my delight this dead cholla had not been removed. It looked like a caricature of some sort of long-legged, long-necked, many-armed animal. It was a great piece of natural artistry.

Did you know the insides of flowers were so sexy?

Pollinators are small to tiny. And almost all species of plants rely on these pollinators.

Owl clover is one of my favorite shades of pink.

The main stem, below and above the arms, showed years and years of stress. The circles that press in somewhat were the result of stress during the year that piece of the cactus was growing upwards. What is strange is that none of the arms show any sign of stress. Did the arms suck all the water they needed from the parent stem and leave mother to suffer?

Just as I was arranging the camera to take a closeup of the stressed-out parent stem this little bird landed on top and looked at me, or maybe looked at my strange head that had grown a large rectangle where my eyes should have been.

This fellow had lots of short chains of fruit that give this cholla its name. It looked like there were two species of blooming brittlebush at its feet.

A penstemon was reaching out to greet visitors. Note that the penstemon’s color was almost the same as that of the owl clover. Blanket Gaillardia had turned their yellow and red faces upwards towards the sky.

Tree tobacco, Nicotiana glauca. Native Americans smoked the leaves of plants of the genus Nicotiana.

This wall was hard to read, even when standing right in front of it. DBG’s symbol is at the head of the line followed by the motto “conservation, research, exhibition, education.”

This was quite a sculpture of a well-fed Eve.

Botero called her Reclining Woman.

But she was holding an apple so I call her Eve.

Now, isn’t this an unusual and good use of the ribs of a saguaro that has finished the fleshy portion of its life span.

Two areas of the garden were under construction. Apparently the Christiansen Family had donated the funds for this project.

Queen Victoria was easily recognized because she was outlined in white. More bright yellow desert marigold flowers.

The art community had decided to be polite. I wonder if Botero invented the phrase “exaggerated volume” of if he used something indicating “fat” when he talked about his style.

Tiny coffee pot, exaggerated fruit.

Family relaxing in the woods. Notice the almost-cat-like body of the dog.

Look back up at the picture. Which small human is the doll?

And a discreet look at the family relaxing at the beach.

Useful Beauty

I don’t believe I had ever seen this agave before. It certainly gives plenty of warning to stay back away from its body.

Thorn-crested refers to the tips of the leaves. Notice how thin the last inch or so is. It could puncture like a thorn.

An agave just beginning to grow its asparagus. The agave plant quits gathering new food thru its roots and spends all the growth-sugars in its leaves to send up the tall, thick stalk that will bear lots of seeds or bulblets, depending on the species.

I didn’t notice when my camera decided to choose a picture to take.

I think the agave were finally (recently) placed in the Asparagus Family based on DNA studies.

This fellow doesn’t give up on life. While quite young it suffered injuries to some meristem areas on the outer edge of a wound on its top. The barrel shape that remained was barely visible from/at the back side of this cactus. This type of response to injury is called a “crest” or crestate or cristata because of the layers of identical shelves that make up each of the balls you can see.

This fellow had me stumped. All I could see was the response to injury. I could not see any uninjured cactus parts to try to determine what kind of cactus it might be. Marilyn said it looked like a coiled up snake.

While looking up the myrtillo cactus tree (yet to come in this blog) I found this foto. It sort of resembles the snake except it is not lying flat on the ground.

UNSPECIFIED – MAY 22: Myrtillocactus geometrizans cristata, Cactaceae. (Photo by DeAgostini/Getty Images)

This colorful rock had a garden of its own.

Prickly pear in my favorite shade of pink.

The sign at its feet identified this cactus as a cardón. But the skin of the arm was a different color than the main stem. And the bluish arm had a design on the skin between ribs, whereas the green stem did not.

In spite of this sign, I still wonder if the arm were grafted onto the main stem.

This seemed to be a crested totem pole cactus. There are two or three pieces of totem pole at the base.

And here is the Myrtlliocactus tree. Where is the part of this cactus that grew before an injury occurred?

Seeing so many crested cacti made me wonder if donors fork over money to buy plants when they come on the market or does DBG keep a reserve fund set aside specifically to buy crested specimens.

This is a picture of a uninjured Whortleberry Cactus I copied from the Internet.

Two blooming yucca waved goodbye as we left the garden.

When I got home I saw this vehicle parked on 6th Avenue right beside our condominium. I walked over to take a picture and watched a young man go from the back of the small van to the white car and work on fastening the contraption on top. The young man took a few minutes to talk to me. The Firefly company constructs advertisements on people’s cars (and pays them as logn as their vehicle is displaying the ad). The “storytelling” is the story each advertisement tells. I don’t recognize the white car so I don’t think it belongs to anyone in our condominium.

As I reentered out carport I took a minute to admire our aloe garden. I’ve never seen it produce so many flower stalks. Our winter rains came at just the right time.

Vegan Goodbye Lunch

Once a month Barbara hosts a vegan group at the group’s get-together. Altho I am not a vegan she has invited me. I enjoy the lunches because it gets me out of the house and into a group of interesting people. March 24 was a somewhat special occasion.

Barbara does beautiful needlework, generally types of quilting. Until they retired from Florida to Arizona she had a quilting pattern and lessons business.

Aren’t these Native American women beautiful?

Did you know that saguaro blossoms are actually white? Many/most artists put red things at the tips of saguaro arms. The red items are fruit. When ripe and fleshy the fruit bursts open to invite birds to feast and drop the seeds elsewhere in the desert. When open, the fruit looks like red flowers with wide, fleshy petals.

The other little fellow with white blossoms is a type of agave. And all of you probably recognize the prickly pear cactus in lower left. The red spots on it are its fruit called “tuna.” I don’t know why botanists chose the word “tuna” to mean “fruit of prickly pear cacti.” It doesn’t taste anything like tuna fish; some species taste like condensed watermelon.

I haven’t figured out what species of feline this long-nosed specimen is. It rested on the back of a couch and watched us eat our non-meat meals. This cat was not at all interested in the food.

There are so many dishes to choose that it is difficult to not overeat.

One couple is pulling out permanently. That is because this week they are moving to Virginia where they have an extensive assortment of family and friends.

Barbara had bought this card and we all wrote our good wishes for their happy future.

Bunita is an annual temporary piece of Barbara’s needlework.

SVM At Heard

The Heard is still busy promoting the exhibit of Maria Martinez’ pottery. Tuesday evening the Heard asked S’edav Va’aki if the museum would like to have a table at a special event Saturday. SVM responded affirmatively and the volunteer coordinator was assigned to woman the table. She sent an email early Wednesday to all the SVM volunteers and only I had some time Saturday to assist her. My blog is short.

This is the sign at the entry table where admission is paid. I said, “I am working at the S’edav Va’aki table,” and the young man handed me a sticker for my shirt to show I had been officially admitted. Paying people were given the same stickers.

I have left this foto as large as I can so that you might be able to read all the writing.

I had selected 1 to 3 pm to help Becca. (Otherwise, Becca was alone from set-up time at 9 am til 1 pm. She/we closed up at 3 pm.) I arrived a little early so I stepped over to a brick paved area and took a couple pictures of the dancers, a couple of older boys and a couple of very young girls. They were very good dancers. They were part of the Cloud Eagle Seasonal Dance Group. From the cut and designs of the shirts and dresses I could tell they were from a pueblo but I had no idea which one.

This web site https://hsc.unm.edu/news/2023/_media/pdf-b-nahm-srmccloudeagle-flyer.pdf says the dance group is composed of dancers from the Jemez and Zuni tribes. These two tribes speak languages different from the somewhat nearby pueblos along the upper Rio Grande in New Mexico. The Jemez speak Towa and the Zuni speak Zuni. I’m not sure why they banded together for the dance group.

When they finished their dances they came walking along in front of our tables. Dancers first,

Followed by drummers/singers.

By this time I was at my volunteer post. How do you like this table for two? By the way, a breeze had begun blowing by the time I took this foto. I managed to catch the tablecloth between light wind gusts.

I asked this young woman if she had ever visited SVM. She had not and she stepped up to talk. After we finished chatting about the museum and archaeological grounds I asked if I could take a picture of her shirt. While I was taking the picture she told me the name of the dancer. I did not understand the name and asked her to spell it.

She said, “It’s on the back of my shirt.” She said they had won the annual chapmionship at the Heard in 2020, 2022, 2023, and 2024.

The Duncans, the winners in 2021, often exhibit their skills and are better known than the Sinquah.

This man and friends bought food and sat at a picnic table across from us. I finally got up my courage and asked if I could take a picture of the back of his shirt (the front was messed up with pockets and snaps). He was happy that I admired his shirt. He had bought it on-line during the COVID lockdown from a woman whose husband had been ill and died, and the woman apparently needed money to pay the bills. We both assumed it is a vintage shirt, maybe dating back into the 1960s.

Fascinating katsinas and related spiritual beings.