106 NATURE-BASED EXPRESSIVE ARTS THERAPY
view of indigenous communities. This is community as inclusive of
all persons as well of the entire cosmos. Indigenous epistemologies
are built around ecological sustainability so that each person’s sense
of identity is interwoven with others and with living well in a specific
place. The survival of the individual is synonymous with that of the
family, clan and tribe. Family includes everything.3. Imagination and story
I don’t know how old I am. I’m really old. I don’t remember that
time when I was born, but I remember long time ago when I was
just a little girl. The rain came in the night, and my grandfather
said, “You should not be lying down. Get up.” He said it like that
to me. Then we made a fire and we sat talking about how we
were blessed until the rain had passed. “New plants will grow
now,” my grandfather said. Then he told me that I should know
all the plant people and learn to call them by their name. “The
plant people go wherever they want,” he said. “If they want to
move, they will. If they want to stay, they will. It’s up to them.
Now,” he said, “you must tell me a story. It’s the Navajo way.” So I
told him my best story, one I’d never told anyone. “My best time,”
I said, “is when the sunflower people come. They cover Mother
Earth with that yellow flower. I like her in her yellow dress.” I
said it that way to him. Then he told me that flowers come in
many different colors, just like people are made in many different
colors. We all come from Mother Earth, and we will all return
to her one day, because we are her. The next morning, when I
awoke, right there by my cheek was this bag that my grandfather
had made for me in the night while I was sleeping. It was filled
with sunflower seeds. (Atkins 1996, p. 402)
Sharon French and her daughter Julie Birch are of mixed Navajo,
White and Paiute descent. We usually stopped to visit with them at
Burch’s Trading Post on the way to camping in Chaco Canyon. Once
when we were stranded by a snow storm, they took us into their
home, prepared food, sang and told stories from Sharon French’s