Tidbits from the PBS American Masters profile of Momaday, who died recently: “I believe firmly in blood memory.” And “I write for the thing that is trying to be born.” I have a novel about my great-aunt May and my grandmother’s generation that roots itself on the old homestead found 10 miles due north of Bushnell, Nebraska. I have been writing it for 20 years. At last I have a very strong voice. I can’t deny the voice. I can’t tell you where the story will go. But I need to get back to the Plains.
The itinerary: Fly into Denver. Back to Bushnell and Kimball, and that homestead. Up to the Niobrara River, where SEVEN different ecosystems come together. That has to be the definition of sacred. Up then, too, to Rosebud, where my friend Phil Crazy Bull is buried at St. Francis Mission. He shows up as a character in the May book. The May book is entitled May Overton’s Last Stand, in an echo of Custer. Not sure how that will fit in but Custer is a Plains story and a reckoning. Then down to Willa Cather and Red Cloud. Maybe back to Denver by then. A lot of driving. Wide spaces. Grass and wind.
Momaday said he was gathering himself in terms of ancestry. So am I. There are a lot of stories. More on the Rhode Island connection soon. But I have been here 400 years, both sides. Perhaps I am like the naturalized grasses that now make their home in the historic cemeteries around here. Feeding off of bones and rags, stories and left-alone soil. Aho. Amen.