Medicine Man
by Raymond Cannefax
Copyright © 2018, 2024
Medicine Man . . .
Years ago, in a rustic log cabin diner in Ruidoso, New Mexico, I enjoyed spending an evening with an Apache elder who asked to join me at my table. It was one of those rare and quiet winter wonderland sorts of evening with big, fluffy snowflakes slowly floating to the ground, reflecting the light illuminating the little town of Ruidoso from the streetlamps that line the streets. Aside from the aging proprietor the unnamed diner, my newfound dinner companion and I were the only guests that evening. Considering the other tables were unoccupied, I pondered why he asked to join me. Without hesitation, I welcomed him to pull up a chair. I had seen this Apache elder at the Sierra Blanca ski area during the pre-season refresher. Given his general appearance and demeanor, I was not surprised to learn that my dinner companion was the Medicine Man of the Apache Nation, a Shaman. He was attired in a beautifully beaded deerskin vest upon which his salt & pepper braids rested. He had creases etched into his face as deep as the Grand Canyon but sanded smooth by his gentle smile. His dark eyes were bright enough to allow one to believe the Universe had placed galaxies in them to provide their sparkle. His well-worn Levi jeans was accentuated by a silver buckled belt and a beautiful turquoise necklace hung from his neck. I initially questioned why he had chosen to join me that night but have not question that since.
As we conversed, the old man conveyed personal concerns he and others of the Apache Nation harbored about the state of mankind and provided answers to questions I asked about various topics. He was a great conversationalist with an accent common to Native Americans. In addition to all else, he had a pleasant-sounding Apache name, Goiahn. Our conversation revived memories of my youth, memories of chats with my great-grandfather, Ludwig Krippner, one of the wisest men I have ever known. Between the age of three and seven, I had the good fortune of spending summers with this wonderful man at his home in the small village at the base of the Bavarian Alps, Bad Endorf. Many of our chats took place in the apple orchard that adjoined the home. Along with my grandmother who raised me, my great-grandfather, Ludwig taught me much about life without teaching. When I was four or five, I learned that even after chopping off a chicken’s head, chickens still try to fly for a few seconds.
As we ate, my dinner companion expressed his concerns about many matters impacting mankind around the globe. He frequently referring to the teachings of his father and the ancestors from whom he learned the tremendous importance of life, from them he learned the value of spiritual and physical balance, and of nature’s requirements to keep our sacred planet unscarred. Goiahn shared his personal beliefs along with scientific evidence that the time had come for humanity to correct its destructive behaviors in order to save ourselves. “Men are flawed creatures, always. Me too,” the Medicine Man said as he began responding to a question I posed. "Man was never so flawed like now, and things with man are not getting better,” he continued. “Men no longer like to listen to things that are not about money or power. The spirits worry.”
That comment from my dinner companion moved our casual conversation to a more serious level as we continued getting to know one another in that charming log cabin diner on that dream-like winter night, giant snowflakes continuing to slowly float to the ground in the little village illuminated by a soothing glow emitted by the charming old streetlamps of Ruidoso.
“For many years, man forgets how sacred our land is. Not only white man, my people too,” Goiahn said in a slow, methodical fashion to assure I understood every word he spoke. “The land is a treasure that many use only for making money but with not understanding that they are murdering Mother Earth.”
Listening to him speak provided me the sense that what he was feeling and sharing with me came from his heart, not his brain or from the scientific material he had studied, but from his heart and soul.
The delivery of the Medicine Man's wisdom was sincere and filled with concerns for the future of the human race. His sincerity was obvious as I studied the changing expressions displayed on his face, the wide-open eyes that never stopped sparkling and the far-reaching gestures he made with his out-stretched arms and hands to emphasize his emotions regarding the topics of which he spoke. There was distinct emphasis on certain words, along with the occasional tone of frustration as he declared what he and members of his tribe, and other Native American tribes, perceived to be mankind’s slaughter of Mother Earth.
Not all of which he spoke was new to me. Shamen from other tribes of Native Americans, and from cultures that span our globe have addressed similar concerns in documentaries I had read. These wise men continue to provide us warnings about the harm we are doing to our environment and the harm we are doing to ourselves as we work toward our undeclared, yet obvious goal to self-implode and become the next mass extinction. After about forty minutes into our conversation, I sensed an opportunity and garnered the courage to seek an answer to a question that encroached the front of my mind periodically; a long-harbored question in respect to my personal mortality. It was a question that had lingered with me for most of my decades on planet earth, a question for which no one with whom I had previously addressed it was able to provide an answer, a question for which I had stopped seeking an answer due to the complexity of the subject and the related incidents.
As I presented the topic to Goiahn, I explained how I had inexplicably escaped my life coming to an end on several occasions and then wondered why, when it appeared I should have been booted out of the camp of the living and was allowed to continue living and without sustaining serious injuries. I clarified having been perplexed by my continued survival of potentially deadly events in which I sustained only minimal bodily harm, a broken wrist being most severe.
“When was the first time this happened to you,” Goiahn asked after a period of silence and his obvious visual analysis of me. The first incident I conveyed was of an incident that took place when I was eight or nine years old, as I played with friends on the top of an old medieval look-out tower that is part of the fortification surrounding my hometown of Landsberg. Having climbed to the top of the towers with classmates, as we had done before, rather than slowly inching around the perimeter of the tower wall, I decided to run across the middle of the considerately rotted wooden floor of the ancient tower’s upper deck. When almost to the other side, I began to hear the rotted wood floor begin to crackle as it began to collapse behind me and fall to the tower’s lower floors, taking remaining remnants of rotted flooring with it. With my final step, I grabbed the top of the tower wall and stood on the floor’s narrow decking remains that protruded from the stone wall. My friends, standing on the tower’s top level stone support ledge across from me yelled their concern for the safety of the narrow staircase which we had to descend, we knew remained intact because like the tower, it was made of stone. Fear was obvious in our voices as we yelled to one another about getting down. Not only was descending the narrow stairs, now lacking the wooden support rails a concern, I had to work my way back to the other side of the tower, to my friends with only a two to three inch ledge for my support and then all of us to work get to the staircase on that narrow ledge. It was a long way down and none of us was sure we would make it safely to the bottom. We succeeded.
“What other times did you think you could have died?” Goiahn asked.
There were two incidents that continued to stand out as events where I survived despite the odds being against my survival. For those two I decided to provide details.
I began by telling him of when I was robbed at gunpoint, in the heart Watts, CA, where I found myself staring down the barrel of a revolver in the hand of a robber.
“After having handed over my wallet, cufflinks and the money in my pockets the robber who continued having his gun pointed at me, did something I will never forget,” I told Goiahn of that incident by quoting the assailants words which I will never forget.
“You rich white fuckers are all the same. You got tons of dough, drive shiny new cars and dress like movie stars, and you hand me nothing more than fucking pennies,” were the words I heard just before hearing the click of the pistol’s hammer hitting either a dud, or an empty chamber. “Lucky fucker,” he uttered with a half smile as he slowly exited my car with my wallet, cufflinks, tie clip and pocket change. “Get the fuck outa my town, honky, before I reload my piece.”
“So, the gun was loaded?” asked Goiahn. “I don’t know. The only thing I know is that there was a click when I presume he pulled the trigger.” “Any others like that one, where you really could have died?” Another close call I presented to Goiahn involved a crash that took place while photographing a Grand Prix racing event, when an out-of-control Formula-1 race car became airborne and flew over me at high speed, missing my head by inches, hitting trees behind me and seriously injuring the driver. It may be beneficial to know that this conversation with the Medicine Man took place when I was twenty-six years old; far from having lived a full life but having experienced situations most do not experienced throughout their entire lives. “Did you think you could have avoided these kind of situations?” “Risking my life was not even something I thought about until after I had survived, except the car crash where I was going too fast for the curvy road,” I replied.
I further explained that I was cognizant of having taken inherent risks in some of my activities but assured him that I did not have a death wish. I told him that some of the risks I took might have had a minimal risk of a potentially injury.
“I need to refresh my coffee,” said Goiahn as he rose from the table and walked toward the kitchen with his coffee cup, “Then I want to hear about your car crash.”
More than the other incidents, the car crash was the one incident for which I truly desired an answer. For my edification I hoped for a logical and comprehendible answer from Goiahn. From a priest, a counselors and from a therapist from whom I had sought clarification of my survivals in this crash, there were no answers, only speculation about my fortunate escape from the car. The details of that event puzzled all.
“This is the one incident where something happened for which there is no physical explanation,” I began as the Shaman sat his coffee on the table and settled back into his chair.
Uncertain of exactly where to begin in respect to that incident, I clarified that it was a horrific car crash that took place on the day of my high school graduation and that my car was demolished.
There was only one witness and he, as well as those to whom he explained what he had witnessed, was puzzled.
After declaring that I had been driving far too fast on the canyon road, I continued by telling him that I lost control of my car, that my car had become airborne and reportedly done several barrel rolls through the air before striking a tree, head-on, and landing upside-down on a giant boulder. The granite boulder penetrated the driver-side roof like a can opener, leaving the jagged metal of the car’s roof penetrating the driver's seat.
Later that same week I saw my car at the wrecking yard and was amazed that I survived. The splayed metal of the roof looked like a giant claw trying to permanently embed the driver into the driver’s seat. The rest of the roof was flattened to where it was level with the hood and trunk, and the car was visibly bent in the middle. How I got out of the car is the question that lingered in my mind ever since the day of that crash.
The one witness to that crash told police that he had seen my car flying through the air and then suddenly saw my body in the air in front of the car just before, or just as the car hit the tree.
Therefore, the question remains: How did I get out of that car, how did I end up mid-air, flying away from the car prior to, or as the car was stopped upon striking the tree and then collapsing onto that boulder at the base of that tree? I ended up on the asphalt with relatively serious abrasions, cuts and bruises, but still capable of putting on my gown and cap that evening and attending my high school graduation.
Without obvious emotion, Goiahn’s penetrating eyes locked onto mine as he asked me about what caused the car to become airborne. There appeared to be a different intensity in those bright eyes of his which now were intently focused.
“Tell me again about you flying in the air and why your car was in the air,” Goiahn requested.
I explained that I was driving far too fast around a bend on that canyon road and lost control of my car, causing it to skid sideways and causing it to roll. I clarified that I had no idea of how it got off the ground or far above the road it was. I further declared that I had virtually no memory of what transpired after I lost control of the car and was sliding sideways, and that I had no idea of how I managed to get out of the car.
“I remember losing control, but I have no memory of anything else until I felt the pain of my body hitting the pavement and then some guy helping me get to the side of the road.”
As I neared the end of recounting my car crash, Goiahn’s look into my eyes intensified even more and for a lengthy period of time, without him moving or speaking he stared into my eyes.
I had no concept of what to think and sat there as quietly as Goiahn, waiting for him to say something.
After what seemed an eternity, he reached forward, asked me to put my hands together and to place them between his. Goiahn clasped my hands, closed his eyes and turned his head upward, toward the diner’s knotty-cedar ceiling and softly said some words in his native tongue. It felt as though we held that posture forever. The stillness and quiet was comforting, but also deafening. While he continued looking upward, I felt the Medicine Man, tighten his clasp on my hands. Slowly he lowered his head, opened his mesmerizing dark eyes, and again, stared directly into mine, saying nothing for the longest time as his eyes continued penetrating mine, potentially penetrating the walls of my soul. My hands remained gripped between his.
“The spirits have blessed you,” Goiahn declared before a lengthy pause, his expressionless face slowly returning to the slight smile that had been present through our earlier conversation. “A great spirit is with you, the ancients tell me when I ask them for help with your question,” he stated as his hands tightening their grip on mine even more.
His serious expression had warmed and became comforting as he loosened his grip on my hands and continued to deliver his belief in respect to why I had been so fortunate to have survived so many close calls.
“The dark spirit remembered he didn’t collect your soul when the tower floor fell. He came for you again some other times and still didn’t collect your soul," Goiahn said as he gave reason as to why I escaped those close calls with fate. "When you crashed your car into the sacred tree that still lives, the dark spirit thought he had captured your soul and finished his job. Your soul, he thought, was his and he crossed your name off his list.”
As if transfixed, I listened intently as the Medicine Man continued to explain something for which I had never found an answer. Friends and others with whom I discussed some of these incidents had various opinions, but none could explain the why of my survival. “Lucky,” was the common response from others.
“You broke from the dark spirit’s grip before you landed on the road and lived to be here today,” was his concluding comment regarding the crash.
The medicine man provided concepts I had never given considerable thought or consideration, spirits being among us, spirits in the world of the living. Ecclesiastical matters were relatively foreign to me.
“Your great spirit watches always and is strong. Even now, in our mountains, I feel your spirit watching. Your great spirit, your spirit of light, takes you away from the car before it was smashed onto the rock. Your great spirit helped you reach the other side of the tower before the tower floor fell. Your great spirit made the bullet in the gun not work, and your great spirit pushed the racing car away from you, into trees.”
Slowly and methodically, the Medicine Man provided his explanations and his interpretation of how I survived situations that could have brought an end to my life. I was amazed, perhaps mesmerized at what he said of these events, events which I considered as odd coincidences, or just sheer luck, but had never understood.
With a more relaxed atmosphere between us again, I asked about some other incidents, such as one in the Organ mountains, only a few months earlier, when I lost my grip while mountain climbing, slipping and sliding on a steep granite face only to have my fall arrested a few feet before the granite wall, undercut by time, providing a free-fall to the scree field, sixty to one hundred feet below. Though on belay, my climbing partner was only attached to the mountain slope we by a very small pine tree no taller than perhaps three feet and with a trunk no thicker than three inches. I did not provide these specific details to Goiahn and only stated that I had a mountain climbing incident which, were it not for my partner, would have been fatal. I did not disclose how my climbing partner was secured to the granite slope we were ascending or anything other than my losing of grip as I climbed that peak.
"The great spirit holds the root of the tree that your rope was tied to, so you and your friend will not fall over the edge."
The question that come to my mine, in respect to the Medicine Man’s comments about my close call, was how Goiahn had knowledge of details I did not disclose? How he knew of things other than what I mentioned about that climbing incident? How he knew that the belay rope was tied to a small tree?
"Why, Goiahn? Why, all these many times," I asked, quizzically amazed at the sparkle that had returned to his eyes.
“It is because your Spirit of Light takes you from the car before it hit the tree, and the spirit holds the root of the tree to keep you and your friend from falling over the cliff, and that is why you are here,” he declared. “Most others would no longer be here,” he said, gesturing, with his hands, toward the window. “The dark spirit has a book and when he was thinking your soul was with other souls he captured, your name he crossed off because he thinks your soul was his.”
“I really don’t understand," I said in respect to how perplexing I found his answers as I studied the depth and clarity of his sparkling brown eyes, and admiring the braids that rested on his beautifully beaded buckskin vest.
“Understand is not always easy. You have a long life to live. There will be other times when you think you are finished, but you will not be gone. When your time is finished, you will know,” he said softly.
“How will I know?” “You will know because your Spirit of Light will guide you,” said Goiahn with a relaxed and pleasant smile.
“How will I know?” I asked again. “How will I know it is not the dark spirit trying to take me?” Those questions led to further discussion and additional questions in my effort to comprehend all I was being told by this spiritual elder, this shaman of the Apache Nation.
“You will know it is time, and you will call your Spirit, and your spirit guide will come. The dark spirits thinks no longer of you, so there is no fight for your soul, and your Spirit of Light will take you to green meadows when it is your time.”
“How? How will I know?” “You will know. But until then, there is much work for you to do.”
In puzzled amazement I watched and listened to reason the Medicine Man provided to that one specific question I had been asking since my youth, that question about escaping death so many times. Though he had loosened his grip, he continued holding my hands between his and gazed at me with that penetrating smile which I shall not forget as long as I live.
“You are blessed by the Great Spirit. You are young. You must do good for people. That is why you are here. You must thank your Spirit of Light always for saving you from the dark spirit by helping others who come to seek your help,” he explained.
Based on his input, I began to understand that I had a mission to complete but had no idea what that mission might be.
At some point during our conversation, the diner’s owner came to our table and sat an old skeleton key in front of the old man. Nothing was said. There was a nod of understanding from the Goiahn’s head. I offered to pay and received only a smile and head shake as a response from the diner’s owner as he turned and walked out the door.
With my newfound friend, perhaps my earthly spiritual guide, my time in the diner was considerably longer than usual as I listened intently to all Goiahn had said about mankind's road to destruction.
That night I gained a new understanding of the importance of leading a good life, of doing good acts, without being concerned about why I was called upon. He learned that I would reach my highest state of joy late in life with a wise companion who would guide me through difficult periods. He clarified that when the spirit in my soul tells me when my time has come, that I would be ready to accept that with joy and join the spirit guide who would come for me.
When he finished our deep and enlightening discussion, Goiahn, the Apache elder, the Medicine Man stood, placed his hands on both sides of my head and said words in his native tongue. He leaned toward me, and with his thumbs, pressed lightly on my eyelids as he blew a breath on my forehead. I felt as if I was being put into a trance, oddly pleasant and light as a feather. That moment, with the Medicine Man's hands cradling my head, thumbs on my eye lies, was the most physically and spiritually soothing encounter I had ever experienced, provided perhaps by a spirit who I was giving me guidance for the years to come, guidance on how I might navigate life's journey.
“You will leave before next winter,” he said as he moved his hands away from my head to my shoulders. “We will meet again, but not like tonight, and we will have much to discuss and more time than tonight.” As I continued listening, I sensed he had completed what he had been sent to do with me or for me. With an upward nod of his head, he rose and gestured me to rise as he took both my hands between his once again and said good night with his enchanting smile. Leaving some cash on the table, I walked out the door, into the lovely winter night, puffy snowflakes still drifting from the heavens and lightly coming to rest on my head.
As I walked toward my van I turned my head, looked back through the window where we had been seated, and watched the Medicine Man, coffee cup in hand, walking back to the chair where he had been seated during my enlightenment. Upon reaching my old VW in the diner’s unpaved parking lot which had a blanket of fresh snow reflecting the streetlights and making all I saw look almost heavenly, I found a bundle of sage stuck into my door handle. I looked back once more, and saw my new-found friend, my guide, perhaps an extension of my spirit, sitting where he had sat with me, drinking from his cup. I did not return to ask about the sage. Some questions are best left unanswered.
The answers to my question provided an unexpected and amazing experience. The words spoken by Goiahn have resonated within me throughout my life and continue to do so. I inherently understood his answers and all else he told me, and gradually began to comprehend the incomprehensible, the reasons for having survived all the incidents that could have ended my life. I felt then, as I do now, fortunate to have the forces of which he told me, the Spirits of Light, provide guidance while perhaps directing me to complete the mission that is my life. There is so little we know and understand about the spiritual world that lies beyond us and what awaits us when we are called. There is much for us to learn from our Native American spiritual leaders in respect to all that surrounds us on earth.
I returned to that rustic diner many times that winter, but never again saw Goiahn, the man who bestowed upon me his knowledge and beliefs, and I believe bestowed upon me a divine blessing at the end of our conversation.
More than four decades have passed since my evening with that wise man, Goiahn. I will never forget the words he bestowed to me and have comfort knowing the guidance he provided that evening.
The morning following this event, enjoying my first cup of coffee, I felt fortunate that I had enough wherewithal, prior to retiring, to write the details of my encounter with Goiahn into my journal and having recorded the details of my evening with the Apache Medicine Man, recording, as best as I could recall, the words that wise old sage said to me.
There have been close calls since that night, and I have always given thanks to the blessing I believe I received from Goiahn, glance up to the sky and reflected onto that night in the diner; perhaps my way of offering prayer.
I do not believe that I have taken greater risks, after that night in Ruidoso, than I would have taken otherwise. I never considered the ideology of having immunity from severe consequences when embarking on high risk adventures, and rarely calculated risk factors before executing. I simply lived life. Through it all, I continued to survive, did my best to live a good life, helped those who came to me for help, and gave thanks to the heavens regularly.
Good fortune or the Spirit of Light? Only Goiahn may know the answer to that question. With that disclaimer, I feel fortunate in being able to declare that I am thankful for the good fortune I have had throughout my life and for the spirits protecting me from whatever dark forces might desire my failure.
I have done good things for mankind, for friends, for people I did not know, for my family and for Mother Earth. I was advised that there would be things I would need to do but have no idea of how many things, or what those things are, just that they are. As I was informed on that evening in Ruidoso, I will know what to do and when to do it and eventually I will know when my tasks and responsibilities have been fulfilled. As I have believed throughout my life, there is no such thing as a free ride. To this day, I am grateful for being able to pay that price.
My life has been grand, and it has been an honor to endure. That is not to say that it was without issues and challenges. When I am done, I look forward to being guided to that next dimension, wherever that may be. Though I do not believe in the Christian heaven and hell philosophy that I was taught in catechism, I do believe there is a continuum, and I look forward to meeting the Spirit who, as I was told, will guide me into that next dimension where I have confidence, I will be reunited with Goiahn. What a wonderful time that will be, perhaps the beginning of grand adventures in the Universe.
No matter the direction I must take, I will continue making my contributions to mankind as I was informed, I would need to do on that enlightening winter’s night, as snowflakes fell gently upon the quaint little mountain town of Ruidoso.
#####
Postscript:
Medicine Man is the recount of an actual experience in January 1974, while living in Ruidoso, New Mexico, a mountain village near the Sierra Blanca Ski Area. I had seen this Medicine Man previously at the ski area, then owned and operated by the Apache Nation, but I had never spoken with him prior to that evening. When he entered the diner and asked to sit with me, this story unfolded.
With all sincerity, I can state that I feel blessed. Yes, there have been additional close calls that I fortunately survived. Based on what was learned from the Medicine Man I presume I must be doing my job properly, and I believe I am still receiving guidance from both, the Medicine Man, and from my German grandmother who provided support and guidance during my youth, both who I believe continue to provide guidance.
There were times I wondered how long I would carry on. Yet, for just being able to carry on, I am grateful and give thanks to the spirits that make it possible.
In closing I say thank you to all who have helped me continue through a wonderful and blessed life and who have helped me learn and understand the spiritual aspect of living a good life and of accepting and sharing love with all.
