Summary

West, the direction of endings and finding one’s way in the darkness, opens with Harjo, literally, running into a post-graduate student on her way to a dance. In conversation, they find their mothers may be distantly related on the Cherokee side. They find mutual interests, neither wanted to be alone, and they became lovers.

Under a friend’s suggestion, Harjo takes an acting class and finds that acting dips into her unconscious, and she discovers additional methods of knowing within the body. Soon, Harjo is in a lead role of a play in the theater program that has tour dates in the Pacific Northwest. Her stepfather refuses permission for her travels, but the school contacts her mother, and she allows it. The tour remains a highlight in Harjo’s life, one of creativity and discipline as rehearsals often went into the middle...