The wind coming in from the west made the climb into Gallup, New Mexico a breeze. Lou and his son-in-law and his two boys were going to Zuni to help a friend with his crops. One of the boys was about three and wolfing down a bag of Cheetos like they're going out of style. Lou was kind, a mans man, in control of his Navajo roots. Listening to Navajo radio as he drives his Dodge truck over the Continental divide. The Navajo Nation a population of 300,460 in the Southwestern United States. The second largest tribe in the US after the Cherokee. The Navajo language or Dine' bizaad, as they call it, is spoken by more then half the people with 170,000 native speakers. Lou's son-in-law was sharing his wife Tianna's homemade deer jerky with Lou as they went down the divide headed south to Zuni on highway 53. He talked about how Tianna was the most laid back person, and as they were pulling into Zuni he talked about her dog grooming business.
Sometime in the mid 1850's Nacoma, the one who wanders, in the Comanche Uto-Aztecan language crossed the Canadian River at the rock crossing as he headed southwest on the Santa Fe Trail. He and his band were heading to Pecos to trade bison hides for glass beads and drinking vessels with the Spanish. The journey took Nacoma months going over the Sange de Cristo Mountains and crossing the Pecos River several times. Along the way he met other Comanche and saw that some of the leaders were wearing fine European clothes and were wealthy from the trading. Once in Pecos he met Pedro Castaneda de Najera who was there for the same reason, trading goods. Pedro had come up the Rio Grande. The two men worked out a deal on the goods they brought. Pedro told Nacoma about Madame La Tules gambling hall in Santa Fe and the long nights playing the card game Monte. Not in a hurry to go back to the Great Plains Nacoma decided to go to Santa Fe where he met Madame La Tules a successful business woman from Mexico who's real name was Maria Gertrdis Barcelo. Nacoma's good fortune kept him in Santa Fe never to return to the Great Plains as the Comanche were defeated by the U.S. Army in 1874.
Driving out the old ranch road on the Pajarito Creek in Eastern New Mexico Jim and Susan Grafe had a long drive to Tractor Supply in Amarillo. They liked the drive it gave them time to talk. The local high school football team had there homecoming game in two days. This game is a big deal in the Grafe's small town of Santa Rosa. Jim, with the help of his Knights of Columbus, had volunteered to help with the parade and car show before the big football game. Susan, as she has done for years, was running the snack bar at the game. With the sun coming up in the east and refills of hot coffee both Jim and Susan went over the upcoming homecoming game plans. They were both looking forward to the festivities on Friday. The Grafe family originally from Kreuzlingen on the Swiss German boarder had settled in the Pajarito Creek area before 1912 when New Mexico was admitted to the union as the 47th state. The Santa Rosa Lions won 35 to 14.
