Sinagua Rising: A story of survival after a worldwide catastrophe Read online

  “I guess I can understand that, Sunshine, but just look outside. See how beautiful it is? Everything will be fine; you’ll see.”

  “I know, part of me wants to believe that, but another part of me is a little apprehensive,” she whispered. “I know it’s beautiful outside, the Village always is, but I just can’t shake this feeling.”

  “I know that I smell coffee brewing and bacon cooking,” responded Tanner, “which tells me that mom and dad are up and the kids probably are too, and they’ll be in here jumping all over us if we don’t get showered and dressed and join them. I’m sure you’ll feel better then.”

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  People always said that Tanner Westin looked like his dad, Bishop. They had the same brown eyes and strong chin. But it really ended there. Tanner had a Roman nose while Bishop’s was that of a pugilist, a constant reminder of having had it broken more than once in his youthful fights. At 6’2”, Tanner had four inches on his father and at least 15 pounds, though it didn’t look like it given the height differential. Tanner had curly brown hair and was clean shaven; his father’s hair was gray and receding and he wore a neatly trimmed gray beard. Where Bishop was outgoing and gregarious, Tanner was more quiet and introspective. More like his mother, Carly. And he had her mouth. They both could light up a room when they smiled because they smiled with both their mouth and eyes.

  Tanner was now 35 years old, almost exactly half his father’s age. But both were trim and in good shape. Tanner worked out regularly at the fitness center at Arizona State University and played racquetball. Bishop played golf at least three times a week, walking the course, and still hiked regularly; especially whenever Tanner came to visit.

  Tanner had been born and raised in Sedona. From as early as he could remember, he and his father had hiked and backpacked the mesas and canyons of central Arizona. Sometimes Carly would join them, but most often she didn’t. “It was their male-bonding time,” she liked to say. Bishop taught him all the skills necessary to survive in Red Rock country: take plenty of water, take high energy bars, wear a broad-brimmed hat and sunscreen, keep your eyes on the trail, and carry a big stick. Of course, that was an over-simplification but, more often than not, it was good advice.

  On their hikes Bishop taught him about the plants and wildlife, the geology, and archaeology. Bishop had never formally studied about these things but was a student of them from the first moment he had settled in Sedona in 1970. He read voraciously, a trait Tanner had inherited from him, and he joined the local chapter of the Arizona Archaeological Society, whose members had all these skills in surplus. Taking a hike with them was like being in a living classroom. And all the knowledge Bishop had absorbed from them he passed on to Tanner. In fact, Tanner joined the group when he was only 11 and began getting his own first hand education while on the trail with them.

  When Tanner was born, Bishop had visions of him taking over his real estate business one day. But once Tanner was introduced to the archaeology of the red rock country and the history of its native peoples, a different die was cast. After graduating from Sedona Red Rock High School with honors and receiving and rejecting several scholarship offers to play football and baseball, a four-year letterman in both sports in high school, he enrolled at Arizona State (ASU) to study history and anthropology, earning a B.S., M.S., and PhD. And now, thanks to his early introduction to Native American culture, he was a tenured Professor of Anthropology at ASU. Bishop had no regrets, knowing that he had played a major role in his son’s career choice and accomplishments.

  ◘ ◘ ◘ ◘

  Tanner met Tara at ASU. He literally bumped into her in the library in November 1999, when Tanner was a sophomore and she a freshman. They were both taking history classes at the time and preparing for mid-terms. While searching for reference books for their respective classes on opposite sides of a stack, they had worked their way toward the same end and, as they turned the corner, ran into each other. Both dropped their books and, as Tanner reflexively kneeled to help pick up her books, he “found himself looking into the most incredible blue eyes he had ever seen,” he later admitted to friends.

  “I’m so sorry,” he stammered.

  “Oh, no, it was my fault,” she responded.

  “I see from your books that you’re studying American History; is that your major?” he asked.

  “No, I’m studying Elementary Education. I want to be a teacher and it’s a required course. How about you?”

  “I’m a history and anthropology major,” he responded, not once breaking eye contact until he realized he was staring. “I’m sorry, my name is Tanner Westin. I mean, I’m not sorry my name is Tanner Westin, I’m just sorry I hadn’t introduced myself,” he said self-consciously.

  “I’m Tara Kline,” she responded and held her hand out to him.

  As he shook hands with her there was a strange electricity he had never experienced before. He wasn’t new to the “female game” but this was new.

  They both moved their retrieved books to the closest study table and sat down opposite each other, ostensibly to do their respective study projects. But it was evident neither was having much success concentrating.

  Without preamble she asked “Would you like to go get a cup of coffee?”

  Does the bear shit in the woods, he said to himself. “Absolutely,” he blurted! “For some reason I can’t seem to concentrate on my studying,” he added.

  “Me, either,” she said.

  And both of them smiled smiles that would light up the darkest of rooms. They were married in 2000 at the end of the school term.

  Tara was born in 1979 and raised in Glendale, Arizona, a prosperous community in the greater Phoenix metroplex. She played volleyball and softball in high school but didn’t pursue a sports program at ASU. She had always wanted to be a teacher and her parents, neither of whom were in education, supported her wholeheartedly. Unfortunately, both died in an automobile accident returning from a baseball game at Bank One Ballpark, in Phoenix, just two months before Tara was to receive her Baccalaureate. The drunk driver also perished in the accident.

  Tara received a small insurance settlement and a modest inheritance from her parents’ estate; enough for them to move out of the apartment she and Tanner were occupying in Mesa, AZ, and make a down payment on a small home in Tempe. The remainder of the inheritance and the income from Tara’s first teaching job, in the Mesa School District, allowed Tanner to finish his Master’s Degree and go on to get his Doctorate.

  He and Tara spent the summer of 2003 living in a Hopi pueblo on Grand Mesa learning first-hand about the Hopi culture, ancient skills like pottery making and flint-knapping, and spear throwing using an atlatl. Night after night they listened to Hopi storytellers giving their oral history to the Hopi children and their American guests. He used that experience to write his Master’s thesis. Their son, Trey, was conceived in that Hopi pueblo and was born the following February, 2004. Tanner received his PhD in the summer of 2005. His thesis: “The Sinagua Culture and assumptions about life in Tuwalanki,” not only earned him his doctorate and critical praise, but an offer to become an Associate Professor of Anthropology at ASU; an offer he immediately accepted. A decade later he was still there, but now a full, tenured professor. Tuwalanki, as he referred to it in his thesis, is the name of an amazingly preserved fortress ruins on Horse Mesa, not far from the Village, where he and his father, family, and some friends have camped and explored over the years. Though being so close to the Village, the ruins were nonetheless unknown to the general population.

  Though neither Tanner nor Tara participated in organized sports in college or after, they both were athletically active. Tara took step aerobics classes three times a week with a close girlfriend, and Tanner played racquetball and worked out in the ASU fitness center. They both loved to hike and spent many hours hiking in the White Tank Mountains west of Phoenix and visiting the hundreds of Sinagua ruins on Perry Mesa, about half way between Phoenix and Sedona. And,
of course, they both spent many pleasurable hours and days hiking and camping in the Red Rock Valley with Bishop and Carly. Kiera, their daughter, was born in 2010 and both children joined their parents on hikes and camping outings from the time they were out of diapers.

  Tara loved Tanner’s parents and they had accepted her immediately, as if she were their daughter rather than a daughter-in-law. Without this relationship Tara would have suffered far more than she did after the loss of her own parents, and it seemed that Bishop and Carly understood that and drew her even closer.

  Now, they had made their annual week-long pilgrimage to the Westin home in VOC for some hiking, exploring, relaxation, and family togetherness; not to mention Bishop’s infamous 4th of July barbecue.

  ◘ ◘ ◘ ◘ ◘

  The shower in the guest room was large and tiled, with double shower heads on opposite walls. Tanner liked to joke, “It’s big enough to have a party in.” And, a party of sorts is what Tanner and Tara had that morning. They soaped each other, luxuriated in each other’s touch and, when Tanner held Tara close he could feel the tension melt out of her. They toweled off, did their hair, shaved, and applied make-up.

  Tanner wore cargo shorts, an ASU athletic tee-shirt, with sweat socks and his cross-training shoes. The outfit showed off his muscular build and deep tan. Tara, on the other hand, wore a pale blue, sleeveless, cotton blouse and a pair of cut-off jean shorts, which accentuated her trim figure. She had her blond hair pulled back in a pony-tail. Her blue eyes fairly glistened, in part the result of the “party.” She wore sandals, which completed the “California girl” look that Tanner loved so well.

  Tanner gave her a pat on the rump and they were ready to face the day and the predictable pleadings of their children to venture to the Ice Cream Parlour in the Village.

  At 11 years of age, Trey was already starting to assert himself as a young man, but when it came to ice cream he was still a kid. Kiera, now all of five fingers of age, was her daddy’s girl, and an incorrigible ice cream fanatic. Tanner and Tara simply had to hold them off until closer to lunch time. Right now it was time for breakfast and the smell of coffee and bacon were even more tantalizing after the small “party” they had enjoyed.◘

  Chapter 3

  News Alert

  Bishop stood with his arms around Carly, admiring the golden sun rays shining on the red rock formations, as Tanner and Tara entered the great room.

  Though the house was primarily pueblo-style in design, in that its exterior was basically a box with stucco walls, a flat roof with a three-foot parapet, and a stucco wall enclosing a garden patio in front; inside it was quite different. Carly, who had helped with the design, had made sure it had 10-foot ceilings and then had thrust a cathedral ceiling up 20 feet in the middle of the house, spanning the height with a huge laminated wood beam, and several smaller beams, resting on a series of peeled log pillars. The dining room and living room sat beneath the soaring ceiling and together formed the “great room,” which looked out large plate-glass windows that took in the entire expanse of Big Park, as the eastern end of the Red Rock Valley is known, and its red rock formations. The view was framed by Bell Rock on the left, Horse Mesa on the right, and Courthouse Butte snap dab in the middle. To the right of the windows was a fireplace and a large, elevated, covered porch ran the length of the house. Bishop and Carly stood in the center of the windows near the door that opened on to the porch.

  It was obvious they were enjoying each other’s embrace as much as they enjoyed the view. They were almost oblivious to the sound of the flat screen TV mounted above the fireplace and the cartoons Trey and Kiera were watching.

  Carly was three inches shorter than Bishop so that her chin rested on his shoulder. She was still trim and fit, despite having had knee replacement surgery, primarily because she still hiked with Bish, played golf three times a week, and took weekly Tai Chi classes at the Hilton Fitness Center. When her knee felt stiff she used the exercise bike she kept in her art room. She liked to “dabble in pastels” she would say, but had actually won several blue ribbons at local art shows and had sold some of her pieces in the local shops. She wore glasses, but primarily for distance vision. She could read just fine without them. At 62 she still had her blond hair, though it was flecked with gray now, and she wore it pulled back in a ponytail because she knew that’s how Bish liked it, another similarity between Bishop and Tanner. And she had blue eyes that Bishop said “were like falling into a cool mountain stream when he looked into them.” Despite having just celebrated their 37th wedding anniversary they were still very much in love and openly displayed their affection for each other.

  Carly was dressed in her customary blue jeans and denim shirt and comfortable house slippers while Bishop wore his tan hiking shorts, despite the 64-degree temperature outside. He said that “when the temp rose above 60-degrees it was time to start working on my summer tan,” a feeling Tanner shared. Besides, within a couple of hours the temperature would be in the upper 70s. He wore a forest green tee shirt with the Arizona Archaeological Society emblem on the sleeve and the local chapter’s slogan on the back: “It’s not what you find – but what you find out!” He had on crew socks and Nike running shoes, his favorite footwear except when he was hiking.

  They both turned as they heard Tanner and Tara come up behind them. Trey and Kiera were so engrossed in their cartoons they hadn’t even seen their parents come in. Chloe, Carly’s grey, short-haired cat, was curled up on the couch beside the children and Kiera was absentmindedly petting her. Chloe responded with her purring motor, a low rumble from deep in her chest, enjoying every stroke Kiera made.

  Chloe, now a full-fledged member of the family, had literally wandered into their lives nearly five years earlier. Carly, rising early, went out to the front courtyard to get the morning paper and found a kitten of maybe two years of age, appearing well fed and well groomed, casually drinking from the fountain that adorned one corner of the courtyard. When she spotted Carly she immediately went to her and, purring loudly, rubbed up against Carly’s leg. She had no identification. It was love at first sight but, Carly, concerned that she had just wandered away from home and would return if left alone, retrieved the paper and went into the house. By nightfall the cat was still there, showing no intention of leaving. The cat adopted Carly; Carly named her Chloe; Chloe moved in with the Westins—and that was that. She knew a good thing when she saw it!

  “Well Sunshine,” Bish’s favorite nickname for Carly, to which Tanner and Tara both smiled, “it looks like the kids are finally up and we can have some breakfast. Did y’all sleep well,” he asked?

  “We sure did, Dad,” responded Tanner, as he and Tara gave Carly a hug and then turned to do the same to Bishop. Bishop really liked Tara and gave and received an extra-long hug from her before turning to Tanner.

  “Sounded like you two took a pretty long shower,” Bishop whispered to Tanner while giving him a wink.

  Tanner responded with a big smile and then patted his father on the shoulder. “I’ll send you a check for the extra water, Dad,” he joked.

  Tanner and Tara went over to their children, giving them each a hug and a kiss, but neither child took their eyes off the cartoons as they said “good morning” to their parents. Only Chloe took the time to look up at them as Tara gave her a little scratch on the top of her head.

  Carly served up steaming mugs of hot coffee for each of the adults and then began cooking pancakes. She had already mixed the batter and cooked the bacon. She knew the kids (old and young) loved pancakes and bacon. As soon as the first pancakes were ready she yelled out, “come and get‘um or I’ll give’um to Chloe.” The two children made a beeline for the dining table, leaving the television on in anticipation of resuming the cartoons as soon as breakfast was over; leaving Chloe to take a small nap in their absence, unaware that she might have had pancakes.

  The adults stayed at the table eating, talking and sipping several refills of coffee for well over two hours. The kids
had long since returned to watching cartoons. Suddenly, Trey said, “Oh, man” and Kiera simply let out an anguished squeal causing the adults to turn to the television just in time to see a large banner saying “BREAKING NEWS” replace the cartoon show.

  “We interrupt this program to bring you an important announcement. We take you now to Lester Holt at our NBC headquarters in New York,” intoned the announcer.

  ◘ ◘ ◘ ◘ ◘

  The entire Westin household was now turned toward the television. The feeling of foreboding Tara had previously experienced came back in a rush. She felt her stomach clench as she reached out to take Tanner’s hand, gripping it tightly. Tears welled in her eyes.

  The television camera did a close-up of Holt with Rockefeller Plaza in the background. “Ladies and Gentlemen,” he began; a very serious look on his face. “Most of you know, we have experienced a number of atmospheric disruptions over the past week affecting telephone, television, and other electrical services, including some short-term blackouts in several parts of the country. Just moments ago, the Space Weather Prediction Center, SWPC, part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA, released a statement saying that we should expect more of these phenomena, possibly with more severe effects.

  “I have with me this morning Dr. Christoph Niedringhausen, an astrophysicist from NOAA, to discuss these phenomena and to help us better understand the SWPC statement. Welcome, Dr. Niedringhausen.”

  “Thank you Mr. Holt,” the astrophysicist responded in his distinctly German accented English. “I wish I were here to be the bearer of good news rather than bringing one of caution.”

  “Dr. Niedringhausen, would you first explain the phenomena we have been experiencing over the past few days?”

  “Yes, what we have been receiving are the result of a series of solar flares; eruptions on the surface of the sun, that are ejected into space, sometimes in the direction of Earth. The solar flares produce high energy particles and radiation that are dangerous to living organisms, but most are deflected by the earth’s magnetic field and atmosphere. These high energy particles, known as electrons and protons, though generally stopped by our atmosphere do disturb it, however, and that’s what causes the disruption in radio, television, satellite, and electrical systems. They are generally short-lived and do no permanent damage or pose any health risks to humans. I might add that these phenomena occur all over the globe and are not peculiar to the United States. Lesser developed countries, however, are much less affected as they do not depend on electricity like the more developed countries. People in the African Savanah, for instance, will not miss their television, refrigerators, or other electrical appliances because they don’t have them to begin with. So, as I said, people in different parts of the world will be affected in different ways, or not at all,” he concluded.