Ha uu a (Sunrise)
By Crisosto Apache (Mescalero Apache)

I often think about how I found love in a bar, when a bar represented so many other things in my life. The loud mess of chaos, lit in the darkness. When it is cold or lonely outside, there is always refuge there and it welcomes anyone. All of my life I have heard bar stories from my relatives. As a child looking up at your relatives, everyone looks tall and happy.

My arrival in the big city about eleven years ago was small and as cliche as it sounds, only with the clothes on my back and one-hundred dollars in my pocket. The residue from bar-life can leave a person wondering aimlessly without purpose. To the point where he doesn't see disparity in front of him and the trail that it leaves like a shadow against the moonlight. Unknowingly I arrive in Colorado without any contacts, aside froma friend who lived in Boulder with his daughter.

My life and the drifting I have never seemed to mind. It was wherever I ended up. That is what I counted on. Self definition, identification and place of origin, are very important to Apache people. Our place on this earth was diminishing and I along with it. In my mind and inside my body I tossed out any feeling of concern and my relationship to the outer world because the outer world did not care about self definition, identity and place of origin according to the Apache people. As far back as I can remember I was always drifting. Recollecting places, fuzzy places with the scent of alcohol, cigarettes, porches and shouting. Places where I traveled as a child, people, faces and country unfamiliar to me. Now these places, I come to understand were real places and imagined.

My mother has a strong memory and would often tell me stories of my childhood and hers. My self-identification comes from these stories and from her voice. Her life has the same drifting pattern as mine like sand drifting over a small dune being carried by the wind. The beautiful relationship between air and space propels us elsewhere with unknowing destinations. Timeless Native vagabonds and gypsies. Our lives were similar, my mother and I as well as the lives of my siblings. We took endless trips to the convenient stores in town, emptying out our pockets of our bi-weekly paychecks and monthly stipends. At the time that was the life to live. Every place that I resided I reminded myself of home. My reservation is what is left of a culture that was almost wiped out of existence. I come from a long line of warriors and realized recently what my calling in life was. I also realized that this path which has been laid before me will not be an easy road for I have lived much of my early life in selfishness. Now I have an obligation to my people and other Native people, which to help them tell their stories.

Upon arriving to Denver I was not looking for love but had thought I had found it not realizing love was a two way street. The man I thought was the love of my life only turned out to be a mirage, a figment of my imagination. We did the domestic thing for awhile because that's what couples are supposed to do according to the western tradition. An identification and fulfillment of the male and female roles was what we were supposed to emulate. This ideology would never work with those guidelines in the western world, mostly because we could not figure out who was going to be the man and who was going to be the lady. These constrictions can leave a relationship in turmoil because they are ideals that are strictly black and white and very linear. Our relationship was doomed to failure. I had not found love.

I had given up on the idea of love and tried on the suit of lust for size. It seemed more ideal for the life I was born with. Growing up in and out of the western world made me forget where I was from and who I was. It is like melting butter. Everyone knows how good it tastes in everything but the process that it has to take to incorporate it's succulent nature is insoluble. You cannot separate its origin from the end result and the processes it takes to mature. I am not calling myself butter by any means because I am not as good.

It wasn't until I was convinced to attend stripper night at one of the local gay bars that had run into what is to be my destiny. It wasn't that exciting because the evening I choose to go was not in fact stripper night but kareoke night. I was very confused. The bar was filled with half-tanked people who thought they were singing sensations that evening. Who would have guessed that night would last ten years?

I was having a conversation with my mother and she was explaining to me the importance of Sunrise and how much power it has for Apache people. It is our place of origin and desitnation into the next world. It has a place of honor, regeneration and remembrance. It is important everyday to face the east and ask Haishu nagukaande, the Sunrise People, for strength. It was then that my self-identification became apparent. I was no longer a part of the Western world as a gay American Indian and was reborn and reintroduced into my Apache culture as nde isdzan, (Two Spirit). Through this journey I was also glad that my family held onto the tradition of acceptance of "Two Spirit" people and that they were also accepting of my relationship with my non-Native partner. This relationship has felt right from the beginning and I knew so when I took my partner down to my reservation for our ceremonial. He was accepted by my relatives and was able to help out with the preparation of our meals. Feeding the public is a high honor in my culture and the family who prepares the food was honored as well. He was shown some of the traditional aspect of food preparation and blessings. Because my tribe is matrilineal everything is passed through the women. Because we were Two Spirit we were allowed to help out in the cooking arbor. Sharing my tradition with my partner has become a huge part of my life and it makes me happy to share that aspect of my life without our indifferences.

It is difficult to live in the Western world far away from your family, far away from your traditions and culture. To see another Native in the city is delightful but to meet another Apache, no matter what band or region, beyond delight. Gaining strength and holding on to your Native identity in the Western world but it is even more difficult to hold onto your identifying tribe, in my case Apache, is even more difficult. When I hear the Apache language or Apache songs I melt. When I do not hear it I am closed. Every day I walk through the Western world I am reminded of who I am. Sometimes it is good sometimes it is bad. When it is bad I need strength and can't wait for sunrise, so that I can commune with my ancestors and ask for strength and daily guidance. They speak to me and remind me that "Niya", "I am here" and "Guuzhu gu Nagu iinda i", "Life is good".

Crisosto