JL: Can you tell me about you great grandfather's prophecies? Harlyn Geronimo: You mean within the tribes? JL: Yes. You told me about an Apache prophecy one time, but I lost the recording of it when the tape ran out? Harlyn Geronimo: Yes there is also Lozen. She was very intuitive about this. Not only her, but the brother Victorio was also very knowledgeable and very skilful in this area. Just like my great grandfather. JL: And their prophecies, was it similar to your great grandfather's prophecies? Harlyn Geronimo: It's similar, but they had other prophecies too.

Lozen

JL: Is it something that is a secret, or is it something that at some point in time your people will talk about? Harlyn Geronimo: Well it was back then, now if we don't tell about it, record it or write it, we are going to lose it. So I thought about this. I really thought about this a lot of the oral history that was passed down  to me by my great grandfather. You know, through my grandmother, I thought about if I don't tell anybody about it we're going to lose it. JL: Because it's not recorded? Harlyn Geronimo: It's not recorded. I don't know if you have read the autobiography of my great grand father. JL: Yes I have. At least two times. Harlyn Geronimo: It's a good autobiography. It was written close to his final years. It was written by a person that used to work for the the Indian schools back then. Superintendent of schools. On the military reservation. He was the author. A lot of the events that took place, I was told about it.  And I read that autobiography, myself and I wanted to put it in a context of my perspective, of what was given to me. From the Apache's perspective.

JL; Lozen then, would she have been considered a medicine person, did she practice medicine? Harlyn Geronimo: She was very knowledgeable in healing and also using the wild herbs that was passed down to her that was passed down by her grandparents. JL: I know that you know 200 herbs? Harlyn Geronimo:  Yes. JL: How many years would it take to learn something like that? Harlyn Geronimo: I've been involved in medicine since I can remember. JL: Your whole life? Harlyn Geronimo: My whole life yes, I believe now. And I'm still learning. There's a lot out there. You see my wife also has a lot that was taught to her from her grandmother.

JL: So you share the knowledge with each other?

Harlyn Geronimo: Yes, and like for herself, several people come to her from parts of the country that had cancer and she actually cured them.  I actually also work with this myself.

JL: With cancer?

Harlyn Geronimo:  Yes.

JL:  That is amazing. By using the herbs, the prayers, everything together?

Harlyn Geronimo: Yes. You have to have the knowledge.  The payers, also for it to work. You cannot just be specialized in the prayer itself. Without the herbs, it won't work.

JL: What about the songs you told me about?

Harlyn Geronimo: Yes the songs.  The songs are also included in this. A big part of it.

JL: These people that you healed. Are they mostly native American or all kinds of people?

Harlyn Geronimo: Anglos. We even had some come from Europe. Also from Japan. Last year around this time, this person came from Europe. He landed in LA and had his bike with him. A 10 speed bike. He came a good how many miles. I would say close to maybe a thousand miles. To come to our place here. But he found his way to our house here and my wife opened the door. He approached her and asked her for a blessing.

JL: Was he very sick?

Harlyn Geronimo: Yes he was sick. I don't want to mention the illness because he might read the article but he was sick.  She made him some herbal medicine.  Some very powerful payers together. Several songs and he went on his way to New York. Then peddling his way to Florida.

JL: I know that in Chinese medicine, you would have to boil the herbs for a long time. The herbs that you use, do you have to boil them?

Harlyn Geronimo: We boil them and we use like a tea bag. Similar to using a tea bag. But the basic difference between the Chinese herbal medicine and our medicine is that the songs are actually included. And the prayers are also included.

JL; I spoke with this man last week.  He studied with South American indigenous healers. He said if you get sick, you can go and listen to a couple of these shaman songs. It reminded me of what you had told me one time about the snow songs.

Harlyn Geronimo: Yes.

JL: That is what I wanted to ask you. What about musical instruments. Do you have certain types of instruments?

Harlyn Geronimo: Well we use the drum,. it could be one of the stainless steel cans, covered with a buck skin or a rawhide drum. JL: Is it the certain type of beat that you do? Harlyn Geronimo. Yes, it's the beat yes. But we try to keep it as close as we can to the tradition of our drums. You know,  like the tobacco, there are not many people here that are knowledgeable in using the four sacred herbs with it. Because I have approached other medicine men and people and they don't know about it. JL: Yes, is it a secret too. For other people I mean? Harlyn Geronimo. Well, we don't really talk about it. JL: Right. I wanted to ask you about the rattle? Harlyn Geronimo. Yes, I have that. That is used in the big tipi when the apache maidens are performing their nightly ceremony the dance itself. We sing, we use the rattle. JL: What are the stones that you have inside of the rattle?  Harlyn Geronimo: From the hooves from the deer.

JL: Is there a certain number that you have? A certain number of stones?

 Harlyn Geronimo: Well, you have to use all four, legs. 4, The sacred number, 4 legs. Comes off the hoof.

JL:  How does it work?

 Harlyn Geronimo: It all comes together, the songs, the rattle, the cigarette, the prayers all included in that particular dance. The first 4 nights.

JL: Do you have to prepare yourself, also to do the healings?

 Harlyn Geronimo: Usually they come around in January and ask if you can be their medicine man for this particular rituals and you have to start praying on a daily basis and even going up to the sacred mountains. You pray to our Creator, God. and asks for the spiritual part that everything goes fine. All the people that are in attendance, that they are fed well,given enough to eat at the ceremonies. That the 4 days will be a blessing that will prolong her livelihood. So that she will be an elderly. Also that prayers for her schooling. That she will continue on to college in what endeavor she has.

 

Chiricahua medicine man / A. F. Randall, photographer, Willcox, A. T

JL:  I remember last time we talked about the reasons why it's very dangerous to ask a lot of money, other than the 4 small gifts you receive as payment for your services, for when you do the sacred healing ceremony. Is that why it doesn't work for some non-native people who want to do this sort of healing as a business. To make a lot of money on this?

Harlyn Geronimo: It doesn't work for them for they look at it as a business venture, where they are looking for the monetary part, but not the spiritual aspect of it.

You can be rich on your own, but not by using the medicine to get rich.  For instance, like hard work. Or through something else, separate from the medicine.

JL: So, it's not something where you can just pick it up in a book or go to school and get a degree and learn this. Is it true you have to have a special calling, or be blessed with this?

Harlyn Geronimo: That's true, for myself it was my grandmother, the one that blessed me. When I was a little boy.

JL: Then she must have seen something about you, for her to single you out from the others. Did she tell you what she saw?

Harlyn Geronimo: She saw the interest, because I was always there with my mother. At her place. This is may great grandmother.  I'm talking about Kate, Geronimo's wife.

JL: So you asked her a lot of questions?

Harlyn Geronimo:  Yes, I did, and from there it just continued. The oral history. The herbs, and it has just continued up to now.

JL: So you have probably been doing it for about 50 years?

Harlyn Geronimo: Yes. This is what is called Apache Chiricahua tradition. It was passed down to be continued.

 

Chiricahua National Monument.

 

JL: That's interesting. You could teach so much to Western medical doctors.

Harlyn Geronimo: Well, I was invited several times to one of the medical schools, to talk about the herbal part, which I did but, there was some students, not students they had PHD, and they didn't believe that some of these herbs would actually cure viruses. They still don't believe it, but it does, it works. You see in modern medicine you can not heal viruses, remember.

JL: Yes right.

Harlyn Geronimo: But in our tradition, it can be cured.

JL;  How do you see people's spirits and what is wrong with them. How do you know, do you see it or hear a voice or something?

Harlyn Geronimo: Usually part of my fingers or my eye will start twitching. For instance when I was praying for this one person that I was praying for, my fingers started to shake all by themselves unexpectedly. My eye would start twitching, it could also be your heart also.

JL: It beats differently. It changes?

Harlyn Geronimo: Yes.

JL: So then this tells you there is something wrong with this person?

Harlyn Geronimo:  Yes, even when you shake their hand, you can feel the actual person inside, if they are good or bad. You name it.

JL: What about if they are dishonest, a liar. Two faced etc?

Harlyn Geronimo: Yes, you can. 

For instance, we can actually pick up if someone is going to come the next day maybe two days to ask for medicine. We usually have this in our dream. And this can also be applied to solving murders; I don't want to get involved in that area.

JL: Because it's kind of ugly.

Harlyn Geronimo: Too ugly, yes. Solving murders.

JL: So you can see these things?

Harlyn Geronimo: I don't want to deal in criminology. For instance, I have been invited to several institutions close by here, talking to the inmates. I find it interesting but not a whole lot because the spiritual part, you don't know if they are actually going to change their ways or not.

JL: Because they have a bad spirit?

Harlyn Geronimo: Yes. I've been invited to several. I don't know if I should be going back.

JL: Being around these negative people can make you tired, affect you somehow?

Harlyn Geronimo: Yes. It can make you tired.

JL: Like when you go to a hospital. Gets draining. Is that how you get?

Harlyn Geronimo: Yes. It can really affect you. Just like this we can recover.  Yes, we can actually feel it, pick it up.

JL: What about when you do the healing of somebody who is very sick?

Harlyn Geronimo: Well, once you are really into the blessing itself, it doesn't . Not supposed to. But right before, at the beginning.  But after that it, it goes away.

JL: Has there ever been a time when you work with someone, you have to go do it more than one time?

Harlyn Geronimo: Well, usually the first two will do the work.

Continue to PART 4

 

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