Photo courtesy: Danielle Geller
My mother left the Navajo reservation almost as soon as she could. At nineteen, she moved to the city, as many do, to continue her education. In a brown and water-stained copy of an incomplete job application, I found evidence of these early years: From April 4, 1983, until July 1, 1984, she took classes on cultural awareness, health education, and leadership at the “Albuquerque Job Corps Center.” (“It was the best,” a woman who attended the school in the late 80s wrote in a recent Google review. “I will always remember the good times I had.”) For work experience, my mother found part-time jobs in retail at Kirtland Air Force Base; as a file clerk at the “Albuquerque Rehab. Med. Center”; and as a typist at the “New Mexico State Labor Com.,” a position she held for only a month.