Day Ten - On the Road - News You Can Use
Staff Journal

The Final Entry

This is the last day we spend here in this great state of New Mexico. Tomorrow we are flying home, bringing with us much more then what we arrived with.

We are bringing home with us the memory of our new friends the Lovato family.
We are bringing home with us life lessons learned because of the spiritual impact of this area.
We are bringing home with us the sights, the sounds, the silence, and the aromas of this vast land.
We are bringing home with us a new creative energy from the experiences we have had.
We are bringing home with us much more knowledge then when we landed here ten days ago.

Coming home with us is an understanding of the importance of balance between the physical and spiritual worlds.
Coming home with us is a spirit of gratefulness as we give thanks to all of the people who made this trip possible. There are many.

I am thankful for Anne and Nancy for their hard work and dedication to these children. They are the reason we were able to experience this trip.

This has been a trip of healing for me and my colleagues, both physically and spiritually. The students have been wonderful. Their team work and support of each other is commendable. They have worked hard these past ten days. We have challenged them to think outside of the box and they rose to the occasion. As you read their journals you can see that their writing skill have grown tremendously. Daily I can see the wheels in their head moving as they processed new information and contemplated the meaning of some complex theories.

As I trudged up the mountain today my eyes were on our guide as he led us upward to the peaks and the rock clusters of this mountain. Our goal was to find old ruins left behind from his people.  We crossed over a variety of different surfaces; some sandy smooth; some rocky and coarse; some prickly and painful; some effortless; some extremely difficult.  Life too can have these conditions. Each of us experienced all of these conditions together. Some of us welcomed the challenge. Some of us were fearful. Some of us found it physically difficult. Some of us lost the purpose of the defined, chief aim, which was to find the ruins. Each of us may have experienced this mountain differently depending on our past experiences. No matter what, the mountain is the same, as it was eons ago.  A combination of your experiences will determine how you perceive life.

We never found the ruins but we experienced this mountain together; supporting each other; appreciating everyone’s differences; being patient, encourage each other; taking the time to smell the roses and absorb the beauty of it all; Listing to our ancestors who paved the way for each and every one of us.

Reverence is how we should treat all people and Mother Earth.
In closing I would like to thank The New Mexico School for the Deaf for their hospitality and letting us stay here. Without a place to lay our heads we could not have had this journey. From the bottom of our hearts, thank you.

Thank you……….Barb